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DEAN   SWIFT 


uka.n  >\\ii  1 

IKO.M    THE    HUST    IN    ST.    lAIKICKS   CATIIEDKAI.,    UUlil.IN 


DEAN    SWIFT 


SOPHIE    SHILLETO    SMITH 


WITH  SIXTEEN  ILLUSTRATIONS 


New  York  :  G.  P.  PUTNAM'S  SONS 
London:  METHUEN  &  GO. 

1910 


PREFACE 

THE  biographer  of  Dean  Swift  is  confronted  by 
an  almost  superhuman  task.  Perhaps  more 
untruth  has  been  circulated  about  Swift  than 
about  any  other  character  in  history.  At  any  rate  the 
sum  total  is  greater,  because  he  possesses  four  distinct 
personalities,  those  of  the  priest,  the  statesman,  the 
writer  and  the  man.  He  has  thus  been  exposed 
to  a  fourfold  attack,  emanating  from  those  who  hold 
the  field  in  history,  literature,  in  ecclesiastical  matters, 
in  medicine  and  in  psychology.  At  the  present  time, 
perhaps,  the  tide  is  turning  in  his  favour.  We  hope 
it  may  continue  to  do  so.  In  the  mean  time  let  those 
who  think  about  him  at  all,  much  more  write  about 
him,  give  him  the  benefit  of  an  open  mind.  Certain 
damning  criticisms  of  modern  times  have  unfortu- 
nately been  allowed  circulation.  Two  of  these  are 
so  terribly  unjust,  so  entirely  lacking  in  the  mere 
elements  of  that  tolerance  and  charity  which  the  most 
despicable  sinner  has  a  right  to  expect  from  his 
fellow-men,  that  it  is  difficult  to  think  of  them 
with  equanimity,  especially  when  we  consider  that 
the  author  of  one  of  them  is  a  Churchman  of  high 
standing.  It  is  true  that  Lord  Orrery  and  Thackeray 
are  responsible  for  much  of  this  hostile  criticism,  but 
surely  now  in  these  days  of  psychology,  the  great 
men    of  the   past    may    be    treated  with    the   same 


vi  DEAN    SWIFT 

insight  as  those  of  the  present,  and  no  one  may  be 
condemned  without  a  hearing. 

As  far  as  possible  I  have  had  recourse  to  original 
and  contemporary  authorities,  with  special  reference 
to  works  which  could  in  any  sense  be  called  auto- 
biographical. Of  more  modern  works  I  am  chiefly 
indebted  to  the  latest  edition  of  Swift's  Prose  works 
edited  by  Temple  Scott ;  to  the  volumes  of  letters 
edited  by  Brimley  Johnson  and  Birkbeck  Hill;  and 
to  the  life  of  Swift  by  Sir  Leslie  Stephen. 

The  anecdotes  and  stories,  without  which  a  life 
of  Swift  would  be  incomplete,  have  been  chiefly 
derived  from  a  volume  of  "Swiftiana,"  published  in 
1804;  from  the  "Life  of  Swift"  by  Thomas  Sheridan 
written  in  the  year  1785,  and  from  Lord  Orrery's 
"  Remarks  on  the  Life  and  Writings  of  Dr.  Jonathan 
Swift,"  published  in  1752.  Needless  to  say,  I  cannot 
vouch  for  their  authenticity. 

I  have  much  pleasure  in  acknowledging  here  a 
debt  of  gratitude  which  cannot  easily  be  repaid,  to 
Mr.  E.  Armstrong,  by  whose  interest  the  work  was 
initiated  and  by  whose  kindly  encouragement  of  a 
pessimistic  beginner  its  progress  was  much  facili- 
tated. 

SOPHIE   SHILLETO   SMITH 


CONTENTS 


CHAT.                                                                                                   .  PAGE 

PREFACE       V 

INTRODUCTION xi 

I.      SIR   WILLIAM   TEMPLE   AND   HIS   SECRETARY    ...  I 

II.      THE   PROSKENION 40 

III.      IN   THE   BLAZE  OF  THE   FOOTLIGHTS          ....  60 
IV.      THE  CRISIS  AND  THE  CATASTROPHE         .          .          .          .81 

V.      DON   QUIXOTE I40 

VI.     THE   POET  AND   MORALIST iSl 

VII.      SWIFT   IN   IRELAND 236 

VIII.      FINALE 284 

APPENDIX 325 

RIBLIOGRAPHV -33^ 

INDEX 337 


VI 1 


LIST   OF   ILLUSTRATIONS 

FACING    PAGB 

DEAN  SWIFT Frontispiece 

From  the  Bust  in  St.  Patrick's  Cathedral,  Dublin 

THE  HOUSE  IN   HOEY'S   COURT  IN   WHICH    SWIFT  WAS   HORN   .  2 

hoey's  court  as  it  is  to-day 2 

swift's  handwriting 1 8 

Discovered  in  his  edition  of  Temple's  works 

LORD  BERKELEY 58 

After  the  Painting  by  J.  Latliam 

WILLIAM   CONGREVE 58 

After  the  Painting  by  G.  Kncller 

DEAN   SWIFT 81 

From  an  Engraving  in  the  National  Gallery,  Dublin 

JOSEPH  ADDISON I02 

After  the  Painting  by  G.  Kneller 

RICHARD  STEELE I02 

After  the  Painting  by  G.  Richardson 

THE  SIGNATURES  OF  SWIFT'S   PRINCIPAL  CORRESPONDENTS    .      1 28 

STELLA 158 

Frotn  the  Painting  by  Chas.  Jervas,  in  the  Dublin  Portrait  Gallery 

VANESSA'S  BOWER,  THE  ABBEY,  CELLBRIDGE      .  .  .  .168 

THE    ABBEY,  CELLBRIDGE,   THE    RESIDENCE    OF    HESTER  VAN- 

HOMRIGH 168 

DEAN   SWIFT 181 

From  the  Bust  in  Trinity  College  Library,  Dublin 

FRONTISPIECE  TO  "TALE  OF  A  TUB" 1 98 

ix 


X  DEAN   SWIFT 

FACING    PASE 

FRONTISPIECE  TO  "THE  BATTLE  OF  BOOKS"  .    .    .    .198 

OLD  PARISH  CHURCH  OF  LARACOR 244 

From  an  Engraving 

STELLA'S  COTTAGE,   LARACOR 244 

KNIGHTSBROOK   RIVER,   LARACOR,  SHOWING   SOME  OF  SWIFT'S 

WILLOWS,   PLANTED   BY   HIMSELF 244 

REMAINS    OF    SWIFT'S    HOUSE,    SWIFTBROOK,    THE     HOME    OF 

THE  SWIFT   FAMILY 256 

THE  DEAN'S   WELL,   LARACOR 256 

WOODPARK,   DUBLIN,  THE  RESIDENCE  OF   CHARLES   FORD         .      256 

DELVILLE  HOUSE,   GLASNEVIN,   THE   HOME  OF  DR.   DELANY      .      256 

DEAN    SWIFT 284 

From  the  Bust  in  St.  Patrick's  Deanery,  Dublin 

QUEEN   ANNE 286 

After  the  Portrait  in  the  Natiotial  Gallery,  Dublin 

MRS.   LETITIA  PILKINGTON 286 

After  the   Portrait  by  Nathaniel  Hone,  in   the  National  Gallery, 
Dublin 

ST.   PATRICK'S  HOSPITAL,  DUBLIN,   FOUNDED   BY    DEAN    SWIFT     322 


INTRODUCTION 

IN  venturing  to  place  before  a  critical  public  this 
biography  of  Dean  Swift  I  beg  to  offer  an 
apologia  of  the  nature  of  the  work.  To  those 
students  of  history  who  may  chance  to  lay  it  aside 
in  disgust,  as  an  unhistorical  work;  to  those  students 
of  literature  who  look  on  it  as  an  unnecessary  defence 
of  a  writer  whom  they  regard  as  unpardonably  in- 
decent ;  to  those  critics  who  object  to  the  facts  of 
a  man's  life  being  associated  with  his  work,  I  offer 
one  answer. 

I  have  written  the  life  neither  of  a  saint  nor  a 
fiend ;  I  have  neither  dragged  him  down  to  hell  nor 
raised  him  to  heaven,  I  have  dressed  him  neither  in 
black  nor  in  white ;  I  have  not  attired  him  in  scarlet, 
nor  endowed  him  with  a  cloven  hoof,  setting  him  to 
dance  among  fiends  worse  than  himself 

I  have  tried  to  place  him  in  the  grey  light  of 
reality  where  perhaps  some  sunbeams  may  shine 
upon  him  and  occasionally  cast  a  golden  reflection, 
where  the  clouds  surrounding  him  may  sometimes 
be  pink-tinged.  But  above  all  I  have  tried  to  re- 
present him  as  a  man  of  like  passion  with  ourselves, 
of  a  like  longing  for  affection,  of  a  like  sensitiveness 
to  pain  or  injury.  If  I  have  done  this,  I  have 
succeeded  in  what  I  wished  to  do,  and  I  ask  for 
nothing  more  than  appreciation  of  the  man  Swift, 
in  the  human  setting  of  life  as  it  is. 


DEAN    SWIFT 

CHAPTER   I 
SIR  WILLIAM  TEMPLE  AND  HIS  SECRETARY 

THE  ugly  duckling  of  the  literary  world, 
hideous  through  its  misproportioned  frame 
and  uncontrollable  limbs,  is,  as  a  rule,  an 
abortion,  and  confronts  its  mediocre  mother,  the 
century  in  which  it  is  compelled  to  exist,  not  only 
with  defiance,  but  also  with  bitter  reproach,  on 
account  of  its  premature  existence. 

Thus  Jonathan  Swift  passed  through  the  un- 
fortunate succession  of  sordid  and  sunless  childhood, 
morbid  and  friendless  youth,  to  an  early  maturity  in 
which  alone  there  was  any  possibility  of  happiness 
for  him.  The  early  part  of  his  life  is  of  importance 
solely  because  we  learn  from  it  how  there  came 
to  be  in  his  character  certain  inherent  and  acquired 
elements  which  dominated  his  later  life.  "  Poverty," 
says  our  latest  authority  on  the  facts  of  life,  "is  a 
thing  to  be  ashamed  of,"  and  this  Swift,  as  a  boy, 
and  later,  as  a  young  man,  found  to  be  pre-eminently 
true.  Two  of  the  most  important  factors  in  his  life 
were  poverty  and  disease,  and  both  came  to  him  as 
a  heritage  which  could  neither  be  squandered  by  a 


2  DEAN   SWIFT 

dissolute  heir,  nor  put  out  at  interest  by  a  prudent 
investor.  For  Swift,  as  for  others,  they  formed  a 
shadow  which  only  tended  to  disappear  when 
Fortune's  sun  was  at  the  meridian ;  which,  in  the 
morning  of  life,  was  darkly  visible  because  contrasted 
with  the  shadowless  and  sunlit  course  of  others  and 
in  the  evening,  lengthened  and  deepened,  because 
its  possessor  halted  more  frequently,  beset  by  doubts 
as  to  his  way. 

He  was  the  posthumous  son  of  Jonathan  Swift, 
the  descendant  of  an  old  Yorkshire  family.  Pre- 
eminent among  the  members  of  this  family  was 
Thomas  Swift,  a  strong  supporter  of  the  Royalists, 
who  lost  his  property  and  involved  his  descendants 
in  ruin  through  his  devotion  to  the  cause.  Moreover, 
he  is  perhaps  responsible  for  that  strong  and  un- 
compromising attitude  of  defence  of  the  Church, 
and  unshaken  loyalty,  which  formed  another  main 
influence  in  Swift's  career. 

His  father's  virtues,  however,  were  not  enough  to 
save  Jonathan  Swift  the  elder  from  a  life  of  poverty. 

Just  after  his  marriage  in  1666  he  was  Steward  of 
the  King's  Inns,  Dublin,  but  unfortunately  died  a 
little  more  than  a  year  later.  His  widow  had  to  face 
the  world  with  an  infant  daughter,  seven  months 
later  with  a  baby,  and  with  little  or  no  income  to 
carry  on  their  education.  The  family  was  therefore 
dependent  on  relations  for  support,  a  fact  which 
considerably  embittered  Swift's  life.  His  precocious 
childhood  has  left  behind  none  of  those  tiny  remini- 
scences which   make   or  mar  the  childhood   of  the 


c  c 


SWIFT   AND   TEMPLE  3 

genius.  His  autobiographical  record  of  this  time  is 
merely  the  expression  of  a  grievance,  first  that  he  was 
brought  into  the  world  at  all,  secondly  that  that 
event  took  place  in  Ireland,  and  thus  confused  his 
nationality.  His  schooldays  at  Kilkenny  School,  and 
his  college  days  at  Trinity  College,  Dublin,  have  left 
no  distinguished  record.  The  truth,  derived  from 
many  conflicting  traditions,  appears  to  have  been, 
that  his  bent  of  mind  did  not  accord  with  the  pre- 
scribed studies  of  the  University.  It  was  perhaps  a 
case  of  a  strong  personality  trying  to  impress  itself 
on  its  surroundings.  The  story  of  insubordination  to 
college  authorities  appears  to  point,  as  in  so  many 
cases,  to  a  strong  character  moved  by  a  spirit  from 
within,  trying  once  and  for  all  to  overthrow  that  un- 
reasoning authority,  which,  having  tradition  for  its 
throne,  and  ignorance  for  its  footstool,  veils  itself  so 
thickly  in  the  purple  of  high  places,  that  it  cannot  see 
the  light  of  day  about  it. 

He  left  Trinity  College  with  a  character  for  dul- 
ness  and  insubordination,  and,  strangely  enough, 
with  a  degree  allowed  him  by  special  favour. 

The  dispersion  of  the  students  of  Trinity  College 
owing  to  the  Revolution  of  1689,  sent  Swift,  a  some- 
what aimless  and  inconsequent  young  man,  to  live 
with  his  mother  at  Leicester.  She  was  a  pleasant 
homely  woman  of  frugal  temperament  and  an  invalu- 
able capacity  for  making  the  best  of  things.  From 
her  Swift  inherited  a  sense  of  humour  and  a  very 
practical  method  of  making  practical  jokes.  A  host 
in   herself,   in   the   midst   of  a   life   of   poverty   and 


4  DEAN    SWIFT 

sordidness,  she  refused  to  be  conquered  by  the 
machinations  of  an  unkind  fortune.  The  appearance 
of  her  son,  without  means  or  future,  with,  perhaps, 
little  definite  bent  or  inclination,  and  his  prospects  in 
Ireland  ruined,  was  not  enough  to  daunt  her,  though 
her  own  income  was  barely  twenty  pounds  a  year. 
Her  love  for  her  son  was  warmly  reciprocated.  It  is 
the  first  of  those  strong  deep  affections  which  form 
so  pleasant  an  element  in  his  life.  During  her  life- 
time he  carried  on  a  regular  correspondence  with 
her,  and  her  death  in  1710  was  a  great  loss  to  him. 
"  I  have  now  lost  the  last  barrier  between  me  and 
death,"  he  wrote.  "God  grant  I  may  be  as  well 
prepared  for  it  as  I  confidently  believe  her  to  have 
been !  If  the  way  to  Heaven  be  through  piety,  truth, 
justice  and  charity,  she  is  there." 

Probably  there  was  in  her  some  of  the  Cornelian 
spirit,  for  she  appears  to  have  had  no  wish  to  keep  her 
son  at  home,  though  she  would  have  willingly  shared 
with  him  her  last  farthing.  It  is  a  surprise  to  find 
that  the  later  cold  censor  of  women  could  in  these 
days  cause  his  mother  a  certain  amount  of  anxiety 
by  flirtation.  He  had  reason  to  speak  of  the  inhabi- 
tants of  Leicester  as  a  "  set  of  fools  "  who  disturbed 
his  peace  by  their  chatter.  He  appears  to  have 
taken  himself  so  seriously  that  he  could  attribute 
these  pastimes  to  a  restlessness  of  disposition,  due 
to  lack  of  definite  occupation,  but  at  the  same  time, 
he  explains  that  his  cold  nature  would  prevent  him 
from  treating  these  things  too  seriously.  That  he 
was   right   about   his  cold    nature    is    incontestably 


SWIFT  AND  TEMPLE  5 

proved  by  his  later  life.  A  letter  written  to  a 
relation  of  his  throws  rather  a  different  light  on 
his  view  of  life  at  that  time.  He  entirely  denies 
any  intention  to  marry  until  he  has  settled  his 
fortune  in  the  world.  "And  even  then,"  he  adds, 
"  I  am  so  hard  to  please,  that  I  suppose  I  shall  put 
it  off  to  the  other  world.  How  all  that  suits  with 
my  behaviour  to  the  woman  in  hand,  you  may  easily 
imagine,  when  you  know  that  there  is  something  in 
me  which  must  be  employed :  and  when  I  am  alone, 
turns  all,  for  want  of  practice,  into  speculation  and 
thought;  insomuch  that  those  seven  weeks  I  have 
been  here,  I  have  writ  and  burnt,  and  writ  again 
upon  all  manner  of  subjects,  more  than  perhaps  any 
man  in  England.  And  this  is  it  which  a  person  of 
great  honour  in  Ireland  (who  was  pleased  to  stoop 
so  low  to  look  into  my  mind)  used  to  tell  me,  that 
my  mind  was  like  a  conjured  spirit,  that  would  do 
mischief  if  I  would  not  give  it  employment.  It  is 
this  humour  that  makes  me  so  busy  when  I  am  in 
company  to  turn  all  that  way ;  and  since  it  commonly 
ends  in  talk,  whether  it  be  love  or  conversation,  it  is 
all  alike.  This  is  so  common,  that  I  could  remember 
twenty  women  in  my  life  to  whom  I  have  behaved 
myself  just  the  same  way ;  and  I  profess  without 
any  other  design  than  that  of  entertaining  myself 
when  I  am  very  idle,  or  when  something  goes  amiss 
in  my  affairs.  This  I  always  have  done  as  a  man  of 
the  world,  when  I  had  no  design  for  anything  grave 
in  it,  and  what  I  thought  at  worst  a  harmless  im- 
pertinence ;   but  whenever   I    begin   to   make   sober 


6  DEAN   SWIFT 

resolutions,  or,  as  now,  to  think  of  entering  into  the 
Church,  I  never  found  it  would  be  hard  to  put  off 
this  kind  of  folly  in  the  porch.  Besides,  perhaps 
in  so  general  a  conversation  among  that  sex,  I  might 
pretend  a  little  to  understand  where  I  am  when  I  am 
going  to  choose  for  a  wife  :  and  though  the  cunning 
sharper  of  the  town  may  have  a  cheat  put  on  him, 
yet  it  must  be  cleanlier  carried  than  this,  which  you 
think  I  am  going  to  top  upon  myself  .  .  .  your  hints 
at  particular  stories  I  do  not  understand,  and  having 
never  heard  them  but  so  hinted,  thought  it  proper 
to  give  you  this,  to  shew  how  I  thank  you  for  your 
regard  of  me;  and  I  hope  my  carriage  will  be  such 
as  that  my  friends  need  not  be  ashamed  of  the  name. 
I  should  not  have  behaved  myself  after  that  manner 
I  did  in  Leicester,  if  I  had  not  valued  my  own 
entertainment,  beyond  the  obloquy  of  a  parcel  of 
fools,  which  I  solemnly  pronounce  the  inhabitants 
of  Leicester  to  be,  and  so  I  content  myself  with 
retaliation.     I  hope  you  will  forgive  this  trouble." 

Both  Swift  and  his  mother  were  agreed  on  one 
point,  that  he  must  at  once  find  some  occupation,  and 
that  mother's  instinct  which,  for  once,  was  right  in 
seeing  a  swan  in  her  goose  offspring,  determined  her 
in  seeking  for  him  the  highest  possible  opportunity 
of  advancement.  Luckily  for  Swift  she  was  con- 
nected with  Lady  Temple,  and  her  opportune  use 
of  this  relationship  was  the  occasion  which  produced 
in  one  individual,  for  the  Church  a  priest,  for  the 
country  a  statesman,  for  English  literature  a  satirist, 
of  extraordinary  merit  in  each  capacity. 


SWIFT  AND  TEMPLE  7 

In  this  case  perhaps  opportunity  made  the  man, 
for  no  one  could  anticipate  future  greatness  for  the 
youth,  who,  in  1689,  appeared  at  Sheen,  the  residence 
of  Sir  William  Temple.     He  was  then  twenty-two, 
of  ordinary  habits,  as  yet  without  any  of  the  eccentri- 
cities which  marked  him  later,  and  which  so  frequently 
characterize  the  youth  of  the  genius  of  later  develop- 
ment.     His    morbidness    and    introspectiveness    of 
temperament  were  evident  in  his  moody  and  saturnine 
expression.      The   strong    sense    of   humour  which 
helped  him  later  was  as  yet  undeveloped,  and  could 
not  counteract  his  absorbtng  self-consciousness.    Shy 
and   sensitive  he   could   be  overwhelmed  by  a  cold 
look  of  his  patron.     "  Don't  you  remember,"  he  wrote 
to  Stella  in  171 1,  "how  I  used  to  be  in  pain  when  Sir 
William  Temple  would  look  cold  and  out  of  humour 
for  three   or   four  days,   and   I   used    to   suspect    a 
hundred  reasons?"    His  sensitiveness  naturally  arose 
from  deep-seated  pride  which   was   coupled  with  a 
strong  independence   of  character,  a  quality  which, 
inherently  strong  in  him,  had   been   much   fostered 
by  a  compulsory  dependence  for  subsistence  on  more 
wealthy  relations  in  his  youth.     His  natural  restive- 
ness  of  character  seems  to  have  been  held  under  a 
strong    curb    during    the   first    residence    with    his 
patron,  for  in    1690,  Sir  William   Temple   wrote   of 
him  as  of  a  promising  young  clerk,  "  He  has  Latin 
and  Greek,  some   French,   and   writes   a  very  good 
current  hand,  is  very  honest  and  diligent." 

There  is  much  to  be  said  in  favour  of  Temple's 
treatment  of  Swift.     So  far  the  secretary  had  given 


8  DEAN   SWIFT 

his  employer  no  reason  to  think  differently  from  the 
opinion  expressed  in  this  testimonial  to  his  character, 
indeed  Swift  never,  either  in  early  manhood,  or  later, 
during  his  life,  took  pains  to  ingratiate  himself  with 
men.  With  women  it  was  different.  Even  though  a 
dependant  in  the  Temple  household,  he  was  on 
excellent  terms  with  Lady  Temple  and  her  sister, 
Lady  Giffard,  and  maintained  with  them  a  lasting 
friendship,  in  spite  of  the  rift  with  the  latter  caused 
later  by  the  publication  of  Temple's  works.  Educa- 
tion and  ability  without  means  were  then,  as  now, 
rather  discounted,  and  the  position,  either  of  secretary 
or  chaplain  in  a  nobleman's  household,  was  that,  as 
of  many  governesses  of  to-day,  of  an  upper  servant. 
There  is  little  virtue  in  the  opinion  that  complete 
subjection  is  an  excellent  discipline  for  a  proud 
character.  It  frequently  causes  a  complete  recoil 
upon  itself  of  such  a  temperament,  and  so  it  was 
with  Swift.  Sunshine  and  affection  were  the  two 
things  needful  just  then  for  his  development;  fate 
had  done  enough  to  break  his  spirit,  and  Temple 
all  unwittingly  added  to  the  harshness  of  fate. 

"  I  have  plucked  up  my  spirit  since  then,"  he 
pathetically  tells  Stella  later.  "  Faith  he  spoilt  a  fine 
gentleman." 

Probably  many  a  "  fine  gentleman  "  was  spoilt  by 
the  needless  recriminations  and  thick-skinned  lack  of 
perception  evinced  by  the  average  patron.  There 
have  however  been  exceptions  to  this  tactless  treat- 
ment of  dependants,  as  in  Hobbes'  tutorship  at 
Chatsworth,  and  Swift's  Secretaryship  in  the  Berkeley 


SWIFT  AND   TEMPLE  9 

household,  which  were  marked  by  equality  of  inter- 
course between  patron  and  servant. 

For  Temple  to  have  treated  a  dependant  on  a 
footing  of  equality  would  have  been  for  him  to  have 
been  guilty  of  a  social  innovation,  against  which  his 
essentially  cautious  soul  would  have  rebelled;  and 
though  his  secretary  was  a  connection  of  his,  through 
his  wife,  the  force  of  this  relationship  was  not  enough 
to  persuade  him  to  make  a  personal  friend  of  the 
young  man.  He  could  not  help  regarding  him  as, 
at  least,  rather  sullen  and  unresponsive.  It  is  no 
wonder  then,  that  the  secretary  at  present  held  the 
position  of  upper  servant  in  the  household  at  Sheen, 
probably  having  as  his  abiding  place  a  small  ghost- 
haunted  room  in  the  servants'  quarters,  with  sufficient 
space  for  the  bare  necessities  of  life,  including,  per- 
haps, a  rough  shelf  for  the  few  books  which  were 
one  of  his  greatest  treasures.  No  doubt  the  spirit 
left  by  Swift  to  be  added  to  those  encountered  by 
his  own,  was  known  in  the  astral  world  as  a  com- 
plaining and  discontented  brother.  Nor  is  it  difficult 
to  imagine  the  small  room  re-echoing  in  the  dark 
hours  of  night  to  the  gloomy  complaints  and  angry 
recriminations  against  Fortune  which  this  proud 
character  uttered,  as  a  reaction  from  the  submission 
and  unfailing  obedience,  expected  from  him  during 
the  day.  A  mind  like  his  is  not,  however,  satisfied 
with  itself  as  sole  audience.  It  must  summon  a 
greater  public,  and  must  therefore  express  its 
thoughts  that  a  greater  public  may  read  and  under- 
stand.     Thus   Swift   turned   to   writing.      His   early 


lo  DEAN   SWIFT 

works  are,  however,  noted  chiefly  for  their  correct- 
ness of  style  and  metre  rather  than  for  any  other 
qualification.  They  are  the  work  of  a  young  writer 
who  has  not  yet  dared  to  give  rein  to  his  power, 
but  is  still  afraid  of  himself.  Perhaps,  however,  they 
served  the  purpose  of  attracting  Sir  William  Temple's 
notice. 

At  the  time  when  Swift  joined  him.  Temple  was 
living  in  a  self-imposed  retirement  at  Sheen.  "  Self- 
imposed"  is  however  too  strong  a  word,  for  a 
character  w^hich  lives  by  negation  does  not  impose 
laws  on  itself  It  is  a  vacuum.  Its  morals  are  those 
left  by  a  temperamental  "vacuum-cleaner."  Such 
are  those  of  Temple.  He  was  too  cold  to  work,  too 
cold  to  play,  too  cold  to  feel  emotion,  too  cold  to 
avenge  injuries,  too  cold  to  be  loyal,  too  cold  to  be 
disloyal.  He  was  a  moral  Iceberg.  It  is  a  singular 
fact  that  he  played  Jacob  to  Dorothy  Osborne's 
Rachael  for  seven  years,  and  married  her  at  the  end 
of  that  period,  in  spite  of  the  two  unpleasant  factors 
of  scandal  and  smallpox.  The  purity  of  his  life  has 
never  been  questioned,  but  perhaps  the  purity  of 
silver  in  a  mould  is  not  difficult  to  preserve.  Yet  let 
it  be  said  of  him  that  during  the  seven  years  of  pro- 
bation, and  during  his  married  life,  his  faithfulness 
never  wavered.  Perhaps  no  wind  shook  it ;  perhaps 
no  violent  gust  stirred  the  surface.  Whatever  it  may 
have  been,  he  remains  to  be  handed  down  to  posterity 
as  an  example  of,  what  shall  we  call  it — Virtue  ?  in  a 
dissolute  and  immoral  age. 

Much  vapid  abuse  of  Temple  has  been  chronicled 


SWIFT  AND  TEMPLE  ii 

in  history.  He  was  not  a  proportionate  nonenity, 
he  was  not  a  nonenity  at  all.  He  achieved  success 
by  those  qualities  which  were  inherent  in  him,  tact 
and  courtesy.  He  was  no  giant,  neither  was  he  a 
dwarf.  He  did  not  aspire  to  great  things,  neither 
did  he  achieve  them,  and  he  may  thus  be  classed 
with  the  majority  of  mankind.  He  hit  the  happy 
mean,  and  is  therefore  not  open  to  blame. 

At  the  age  of  sixteen,  he  left  Cambridge  without 
having  acquired  either  reputation  for,  or  love  of, 
learning,  and  two  years  later  proceeded  to  travel 
on  the  Continent  During  this  tour  he  met 
with  Dorothy  Osborne,  the  daughter  of  an  ardent 
royalist. 

Dorothy  Osborne,  or  as  she  became  later,  Lady 
Temple,  is  one  of  the  most  charming  and  interesting 
women  of  history.  She  does  not  attract  by  vicious 
brilliance,  nor  does  hers  form  one  of  the  series  of 
beautiful  portraits  of  the  women  of  this  age.  Her 
claim  to  fame  must  be  based  on  a  cultured  mind, 
a  thoughtful  disposition,  a  charm  and  dignity  of 
character  combined  with  the  qualities  of  womanliness 
and  purity,  so  little  found,  and  so  much  to  be  desired 
both  in  the  eighteenth  century  and  in  this.  A  history 
of  her  life  and  character  would  form  one  of  the 
most  desirable  text-books  to  be  placed  in  the  hands 
of  schoolgirls.  Her  letters  to  Temple,  written 
during  the  seven  years  which  they  had  to  wait  for 
the  consent  of  their  parents  to  their  marriage,  form 
a  delightful  commentary  on  the  manners  and  morals 
of  her  age,  and  at  the  same  time  throw  into  high 


12  DEAN   SWIFT 

relief  her  own  beauty  of  character  and  deep-seated 
goodness  of  soul.  A  mutual  attraction  drew  these 
two  together  at  their  first  meeting  in  the  Isle  of 
Wight,  where  she  saved  her  party  from  an  awk- 
ward contretemps  with  the  Governor,  and  after  that 
their  affection  continued  to  grow  till  it  deepened 
into  the  love  of  a  lifetime.  Temple,  as  a  son-in-law, 
was  regarded  with  disfavour  by  Sir  Peter  Osborne 
and  his  wife.  They  looked  on  him  as  a  young  man 
of  unsettled  character,  changeable  disposition  and 
uncertain  views.  Sir  Peter  Osborne  could  not 
tolerate  the  lack  of  enthusiasm  in  the  young  man ; 
Lady  Osborne  had  more  practical  reasons  for  re- 
jecting him.  He  was  not  wealthy  enough  to  be  a 
suitor  for  her  daughter's  hand,  and  there  were  other 
and  worthier  men  in  the  background,  who  were 
ready  to  come  forward  on  the  slightest  encourage- 
ment. Sir  John  Temple  also  had  higher  views  for 
his  son.  Thus  the  course  of  their  love  was  greatly 
impeded  and  their  correspondence  for  years  had  to 
be  carried  on  in  secret,  to  escape  the  untiring 
espionage  of  a  tyrant  brother,  against  whom  Dorothy 
had  perforce  to  defend  both  herself  and  her  lover. 
When  Fate  moreover  had  overcome  all  their  objec- 
tions, Dorothy  was  seized  with  an  attack  of  small- 
pox, so  that  her  beauty  had,  for  the  most  part, 
disappeared  when  she  was  at  last  able  to  be  married 
to  Temple  in  1654. 

Lady  Temple  curiously  enough  disappears  from 
history  after  her  marriage,  save  as  the  mother  of 
Temple's   children   and    the   intimate    friend   of    the 


SWIFT  AND   TEMPLE  13 

Queen,  whom  she  survived  only  two  or  three 
months.  As  a  companion  to  Temple  she  was  eclipsed 
by  his  sister  Lady  Giffard,  who  lived  with  them 
after  her  husband's  death  and  supported  and  advised 
Temple  in  all  his  political  undertakings.  It  is 
possible  that  the  woman's  mind  behind  the  scenes 
of  the  political  stage,  may  have  held  Temple  from 
undertaking  unnecessary  risks,  for  a  woman,  unless 
she  is  a  born  speculator,  has  an  eye  only  to  the 
small  gains  of  life,  and  will  sell  her  soul  for  half 
its  value,  provided  she  receives  a  temporary  advan- 
tage in  cash  down.  If  this  is  the  case  it  is  easier 
to  understand  Temple's  pre-eminently  cautious  mind. 
The  early  years  of  their  married  life  were  spent  by 
the  Temples  in  Ireland,  in  Sir  John  Temple's  house, 
where  the  son  passed  his  time  in  writing  verse 
translations  and  essays.  These  earlier  works  show 
no  real  literary  value,  their  sole  importance  is  the 
part  they  played  in  forming  his  later  style,  which 
is  that  of  a  gentleman.  Perhaps  this  is  enough  to 
say  of  it.  His  life  in  Ireland  did  not  arouse  any 
broad  feelings  of  sympathy.  His  attitude  to  Ireland 
is  that  of  the  ruling  class,  and  he  looks  on  the  Irish 
as  entirely  responsible  for  their  own  misfortunes, 
an  outlook  which  must  of  necessity  preclude  all 
sympathy.  Possibly  this  had  its  effect  on  Swift, 
who  constantly  reiterates  his  hatred  of  the  Irish, 
and  whose  mind,  in  those  early  days,  in  spite  of 
his  supreme  independence  of  character,  must  have 
received  some  colour  from  Temple's  prejudices. 

Temple's    life    in    Ireland    seems    to   have   been 


14  DEAN   SWIFT 

thoroughly  congenial  to  him,  though  farming,  garden- 
ing and  light-verse  writing  were  perhaps  strangely 
quiet  occupations  for  a  young  man  to  choose. 

Ireland  was  certainly  not  the  place  for  him  to 
display  his  talents.  He  therefore  came  to  London 
with  letters  of  introduction  from  the  Duke  of 
Ormonde,  Lord-Lieutenant  of  Ireland,  to  Clarendon, 
who  was  at  the  head  of  affairs,  and  to  Henry 
Bennett,  Lord  Arlington,  who  was  Secretary  of 
State.  Temple,  in  accordance  perhaps  with  those 
qualities  which  write  him  down  time-server,  did  not 
press  his  suit  with  Clarendon,  whose  influence  he 
could  see  was  on  the  wane.  Arlington's  star,  on 
the  other  hand,  was  at  its  brightest.  He  was  pre- 
eminently the  useful  politician,  he  could  play  the 
wise  man  with  the  wise,  and  fool  in  the  presence  of 
fools.  Hence  he  was  calculated  to  be  a  successful 
member  of  society.  His  usefulness  was  the  character- 
istic which  especially  appealed  to  Temple  at  this 
critical  period  of  his  career,  and  moreover  Arlington 
was  essentially  the  man  to  help  newcomers.  He 
was  not  possessed  by  the  useless  notion  that  new- 
blood  must  be  bad  blood,  and  he  was  ready  to  lend 
a  helping  hand  to  Temple,  who  came  to  him  armed 
with  very  strong  recommendations.  His  promises 
to  Arlington  were  quickly  rewarded  by  a  com- 
mission of  some  importance. 

The  affairs  of  England  were  at  this  time  in  an 
unfortunate  condition.  Her  trade  at  home  was  in  a 
state  of  suspension  owing  to  the  plague.  Abroad 
she  was  a  power  without  any  important  all3\     She 


SWIFT  AND   TEMPLE  15 

was  at  war  with  the  United  Provinces,  which  were 
governed  by  John  de  Witt,  a  statesman  of  no 
ordinary  ability,  fully  capable  of  carrying  on  war 
successfully.  France  had  taken  the  side  of  the 
States  General  and  Spain  was  hostile. 

The  only  help  that  England  could  look  for  was 
from  the  Bishop  of  Munster,  who  at  this  time  was 
anxious  to  give  her  active  help  against  the  Dutch. 
The  English  agent  had  therefore  to  repair  to 
Munster  to  arrange  matters  and  Temple  was  chosen 
for  the  post.  Though  the  negotiations  came  to 
nothing,  the  business  was  satisfactory  for  Temple, 
and  he  returned  to  England  with  a  reputation  for 
tact  and  diplomacy,  which  immediately  secured 
him  a  baronetcy  and  the  appointment  as  English 
resident  at  the  viceregal  Court  of  Brussels. 

The  real  contest  lay  between  the  permanent 
advantage  of  England  and  the  temporary  benefit  of 
Charles  II.,  whose  interests  were  to  be  found  in  the 
support  of  the  Catholic,  wealthy  and  unscrupulous 
King  of  France,  while  the  interests  of  England  rested 
in  an  alliance  with  the  Dutch.  At  this  time,  however, 
Louis  was  definitely  on  the  side  of  the  Dutch  and 
could  not  join  with  Charles.  A  Stuart  attempt  at 
unity  was  made  in  1667  in  the  Conference  of  Breda, 
when  England  and  the  Dutch  came  to  terms  in  the 
so-called  peace  of  Breda,  while  Charles  made  a  second 
treaty  with  France  on  the  terms  that  England  must 
make  no  convention  with  the  house  of  Austria  that 
year  and  that  Louis  must  support  all  Charles'  designs 
in  or  out  of  the  kingdom.     No  arrangement  contrary 


i6  DEAN   SWIFT 

to  each  other's  interests  was  to  be  made  by  either 
during  the  year,  and  Louis  was  to  have  a  free  hand 
in  the  Spanish  Low  Countries.  Temple,  following 
the  policy  of  Arlington,  was  on  the  side  of  the  Dutch, 
and  a  permission,  granted  him  to  travel  incognito  in 
the  Netherlands,  enabled  him  to  become  acquainted 
with  De  Witt,  which  gave  them  the  opportunity  of 
discussing  calmly  the  position  between  England  and 
the  United  Provinces,  with  the  advantage  that  both 
sides  could  receive  unbiassed  discussion  untram- 
melled by  the  subterfuges  and  intrigues  of  the  King. 
Temple's  sympathies  were  wholly  on  the  side  of  the 
Dutch  against  France,  and  he  now  sketched  the  plan 
of  a  close  alliance  between  England  and  the  Republic 
which  was  to  compel  Louis  to  hold  his  hand.  It 
seemed  as  though  this  alliance  was  the  one  thing 
required  to  establish  the  affairs  of  England  both 
externally  and  internally.  It  was  hoped  that  by  this 
the  power  of  France  would  be  bridled  and  England 
restored  to  the  same  place  in  Europe  which  she  had 
held  under  Cromwell.  Indirectly  it  was  expected  to 
reinstate  Charles  in  favour  with  Parliament  and  enable 
the  Ministry  to  recover  from  the  late  war. 

The  result  of  the  discussion  with  De  Witt  was  the 
formation  of  the  Triple  Alliance  between  England, 
the  United  Provinces,  and  Sweden,  completed  by 
Temple  when  he  was  finally  called  in  to  conclude 
the  arrangements  as  England's  representative.  The 
importance  of  the  Triple  Alliance  for  us  here,  with 
its  final  completion,  in  the  Peace  of  Aix  la  Chapelle, 
signed  in  i668,  is  simply  the  light  which  it  throws  on 


SWIFT  AND   TEMPLE  17 

Temple's  character.     Macaulay  says  of  it  that  it  was 
the  one  eminently  good  act  performed  by  the  Govern- 
ment between  the  Restoration  and  the  Revolution. 
The  importance,  even  the  advisability  of  it,  for  Eng- 
land, is  a  doubtful  point.     With  regard  to  Temple  it 
is  of  the  utmost  importance.     Laying  aside  the  con- 
sideration of  it  from  the  point  of  view  of  statesman- 
ship,  for    Temple,   who    was    entirely   without    the 
gambling  spirit,  cannot  be  considered  a  statesman  in 
the  real  sense  of  the  word,  it  may  be  taken,  together 
with   the   rest  of  his   dealings  with   De  Witt,  as  a 
monument  to  his  powers  as  a  diplomatist.     For  the 
time  it  was  the  cause  of  universal  approval  and  raised 
Temple's   reputation   to  an   enormous   extent.     The 
Duke  of  Ormond  writes  to  him  :  "  The  success  of  your 
negotiations   gives   no   man   greater   satisfaction   for 
the  part  you  had  in  it  than  to  me.     The  happy  con- 
sequences which  may  reasonably  be  expected  from 
the  conclusions  of  the  treaty  may  extend  further  and 
last  longer  than  I  have  had   time,  since  I  received 
yours  of  the  24th  inst.,  to  consider.     I  confess  my 
first  reflections  were  upon  the  good  effect  it  will  have 
at  home,  and  the  good  humour  it  is  likely  to  put  the 
Parliament   in  at  their   first   meeting,  which  I  look 
upon  as  the  foundation  of  all  the  other  advantages  to 
be  derived  from  it,  by  reputation,  and  all  the  good 
effects  of  that  amongst  our  neighbours." 

Perhaps  three  other  letters  written  with  respect 
to   the   treaty,   form   an   interesting   commentary  on 
it  as   affecting  Temple.     An  official  communication 
from  the  States  to  the  King  puts  the  matter  thus  :— 
c 


i8  DEAN   SWIFT 

"  It  is  merely  in  compliance  to  custom  that  we  do 
ourselves  the  honour  to  write  your  Majesty  in  answer 
to  the  letter  that  you  were  pleased  to  send  us  relating 
to  Sir  William  Temple ;  for  we  can  add  nothing  to 
what  your  Majesty  has  seen  yourself  of  his  conduct 
by  the  success  of  the  Negotiations  committed  to  his 
charge.  As  it  is  a  thing  without  example,  that  in  so 
few  days  three  such  important  Treaties  have  been 
concluded,  so  we  can  say  that  the  address,  the 
vigilance,  the  sincerity  of  this  Minister  are  also 
without  example.  We  are  extremely  obliged  to  your 
Majesty  that  you  are  pleased  to  make  use  of  an 
instrument  so  proper  for  confirming  that  strict  amity 
and  good  intelligence  which  the  Treaty  at  Breda  had 
happily  begun.  And  we  are  told  to  say  that  if  your 
Majesty  continues  to  make  use  of  such  ministers  the 
knot  will  grow  too  fast  ever  to  be  untied,  and  your 
Majesty  will  ever  find  a  most  particular  satisfaction 
by  it  as  well  as  we." 

This  letter  must  have  been  received  by  Charles 
with  extreme  satisfaction  during  the  negotiations 
which  he  was  then  carrying  on  with  France;  and 
also  the  following  letter  from  M.  de  Witt  to  Lord 
Arlington  : — 

"  My  Lord, 

"As  it  was  impossible  to  send  a  Minister  of 
greater  capacity  or  more  proper  for  the  temper  and 
genius  of  this  nation  than  Sir  William  Temple,  so  I 
believe  no  other  person  either  will  or  can  more 
equitably  judge  of  the  disposition,  wherein  he  has 


(Jo      ^       UylaCJL-^ 

ixLuytWt     Jji/riran/v 

SWIFTS    HAXDWRrnXG    DTSCOVKRKD    IX    HIS    EDniOX   OF 

te:\iples  works 


SWIFT  AND  TEMPLE  19 

found  the  States  to  answer  the  good  intention  of 
the  King  of  Great  Britain.  Sir  William  Temple 
ought  not  to  be  less  satisfied  with  the  readiness 
wherewith  the  States  have  passed  over  to  the  con- 
cluding and  signing  of  these  treaties,  for  which  he 
came  hither,  than  they  (the  States)  are  with  his 
conduct  and  agreeable  manner  of  dealing  in  the 
whole  course  of  his  negotiations.  It  appears,  my 
Lord,  that  you  thoroughly  understand  men,  and 
bestow  your  friendship  only  upon  such  as  deserve  it, 
since  you  cause  persons  to  be  employed  who  acquit 
themselves  so  worthily.  I  think  myself  happy  to 
have  negotiated  with  him,  and  that  by  his  means 
your  Lordship  has  been  pleased  to  give  me  a  new 
testimony  of  your  good  will." 

Temple's  own  contribution  is  to  the  following 
effect : — 

"  After  the  conclusion  of  the  Triple  Alliance  and 
the  Peace  of  Aix,  I  was  at  an  end  of  my  ambition ; 
having  seen  Flanders  saved  as  if  it  had  been  by  one 
of  the  miracles  the  House  of  Austria  has,  they  say, 
been  used  to,  and  the  general  interests  of  Christen- 
dom secured  against  the  power  and  attempts  of 
France ;  and  at  the  same  time  the  consideration  and 
honour  of  his  Majesty  and  his  crown  abroad  raised 
to  a  degree  it  has  not  been  in  for  some  ages  past, 
and  we  had  no  reason  to  expect  it  should  be  in  some 
time  to  come,  upon  the  decline  it  felt  after  the 
business  of  Chatham  and  the  Peace  of  Breda  that 
succeeded  it." 


20  DEAN   SWIFT 

Temple  rightly  said  that  he  had  reached  the 
height  of  his  ambition  ;  we  will  add  power,  for,  alas ! 
for  the  vanity  of  human  wishes,  Charles  two  years 
later  signed  with  France  the  Treaty  of  Dover,  in 
which  all  that  had  been  done  by  the  Peace  of  Aix 
was  overthrown.  And  with  what  was  the  negotiator 
of  that  much  acclaimed  Peace  occupied?  In  imita- 
tion of  the  simple  character  of  the  Romans,  he  was 
growing  cabbages  in  the  country.  He  had  by  this 
time  reduced  life  to  its  lowest  terms  and  was  pre- 
pared to  emulate  the  slugs  on  his  own  cabbages. 
"  For,"  he  says,  "  to  say  the  truth,  I  am  very  well 
as  I  am,  being  of  so  dull  a  complexion  that  I  do 
not  remember  any  station  or  condition  of  life  I  have 
been  in  these  dozen  years  which  I  have  not  been 
pleased  with  and  a  little  unwilling  to  leave." 

Once  more  he  was  summoned  from  his  retirement 
at  Sheen  to  extricate  the  King  from  the  meshes  in 
which  he  perpetually  entangled  himself,  to  negotiate 
a  second  treaty  with  the  United  Provinces.  His 
services  in  bringing  about  peace  were  recognized  in 
an  ambiguous  way  by  the  offer  of  the  Secretaryship 
of  State.  But  he  resolutely  declined  it.  Perhaps 
his  own  statement  later  best  explains  his  position. 
"  Upon  three  days'  thought  of  this  affair,"  he  says, 
"  I  concluded  it  a  scene  unfit  for  such  actors  as  I 
knew  myself  to  be,  and  resolved  to  avoid  the  Secre- 
tary's place,  or  any  other  public  employment  at 
home,  my  character  abroad  still  continuing. 

'*  The  Elections  were  canvassing  for  a  new  Parlia- 
ment, and  I  ordered  my  pretensions  as  they  came 


SWIFT  AND  TEMPLE  ai 

to  fail.  In  the  meantime  I  deferred  my  entering  the 
Secretary's  place  till  I  might  likewise  enter  into  the 
House  of  Commons,  which  both  his  Majesty  and 
Lord  Treasurer  were  satisfied  with,  though  not 
Lord  Sunderland.  But  when  that  Parliament  was 
chosen  and  I  not  of  the  House  I  represented  to  His 
Majesty  how  unfit  it  was  to  have  a  Parliament  meet 
without  his  having  a  Secretary  in  the  House  of 
Commons,  and  how  useful  Mr.  Coventry  would  be 
to  him  there." 

Thus   Temple  the  diplomat  escaped  temporarily 
from  the  responsibility  that  he  dreaded. 

Before  however  he  could  complete  the  negotia- 
tions with  the  Dutch,  he  was  recalled  to  England, 
where  affairs  were  sufficiently  disastrous  to  require 
the  services  of  a  demigod.  The  nation  had  lost  con- 
fidence in  the  Ministry  and  the  Ministry  in  them- 
selves. The  sole  remedy  proposed  by  Temple  was 
to  alter  the  Constitution  of  Government  by  changing 
the  form  of  the  Privy  Council.  The  change  which 
he  proposed  was  entirely  inadequate  in  character, 
moreover  it  defeated  its  own  ends  and  only  pro- 
vided the  King  with  a  further  means  of  tricking 
his  ministers.  Yet,  like  Temple's  other  schemes,  it 
served  the  purpose  of  increasing  the  favour  with 
which  he  was  popularly  regarded.  The  prorogation 
of  Parliament  allowed  him  to  retire  to  Sheen  once 
more,  though  he  was  summoned  to  London  almost 
immediately  by  the  report  of  the  King's  illness  and 
the  arrival  of  the  Duke  of  York.  He  found  that 
on    all    sides     he    was    made    the    scapegoat,   and. 


22  DEAN   SWIFT 

disgusted  with  the  treatment  which  he  received,  he 
took  the  earliest  opportunity  of  retiring  once  more. 
A  succession  of  irregular  acts  on  the  part  of  the  King 
still  further  estranged  Temple,  and  his  own  dis- 
inclination to  make  any  definite  side  with  regard 
to  the  Exclusion  Bill  roused  the  hostility  of  the 
King  against  him.  This  was  definitely  shown  by 
the  exclusion  of  Temple's  name  from  the  list  of 
Privy  Councillors.  Probably  the  real  cause  of  this 
was  Charles'  disappointment  in  discovering  that  the 
stainless  name  which  he  had  hoped  would  give  an 
external  whitewash  to  the  Government,  did  not  have 
that  efi'ect. 

At  any  rate.  Temple  now  found  himself  fully  at 
liberty  to  retire  permanently  to  Sheen,  and  he  lost 
no  time  in  retreating  to  his  beloved  country,  where 
he  was  left  undisturbed  by  politics,  until,  in  the 
reign  of  William  III.,  he  was  again  summoned  to  the 
front,  and  once  more  entreated  to  accept  the  Secre- 
taryship of  State.  Once  more  he  refused,  and  hence- 
forth his  part  was  that  of  a  passive  spectator  of 
politics  and  personal  friend  of  the  King.  His  quiet 
life  at  Sheen  was  interrupted  by  the  death  of  his 
son,  an  event  which  plunged  the  Temple  family  in 
such  grief  that  they  left  Sheen  and  retired  to  Moor 
Park  in  Surrey.  We  are  inclined  at  this  juncture 
to  write  an  epitaph  on  Sir  William  Temple,  were 
it  not  that  he  probably  considered  that  his  real  life 
had  begun.  Presumably  he  did  not,  like  others  of 
her  children  whom  Fortune  has  cast  off,  fiercely 
ejaculate,    "  Put   not  your   trust    in   Princes  nor  in 


SWIFT  AND  TEMPLE  23 

any  child  of  man,"  and  then  turn  his  attention  to 
the  Deity.  Neither  Prince  nor  Deity  was  to  him 
of  sufficiently  absorbing  interest.  A  contemporary 
criticism  says  of  him  :  "  He  reveres  the  Sovereign 
(and  no  man  perhaps  ever  testified  by  so  elegant  a 
bow),  he  admires  the  Prince  of  Orange;  but  there  is 
one  person  whose  ease  and  comfort  he  loves  more 
than  all  the  princes  in  Christendom,  and  that  valuable 
member  of  society  is  himself,  Guilelmus  Temple 
Baronettus.  One  sees  him  in  his  retreat,  between 
his  study-chair  and  his  tulip-bed,  clipping  his 
apricots  and  pruning  his  essays,  the  statesman,  the 
ambassador  no  more,  but  the  philosopher,  the  Epi- 
curean, the  fine  gentleman  and  courtier  at  St.  James' 
or  at  Sheen,  where  in  place  of  kings  and  fair  ladies 
he  pays  his  court  to  the  Ciceronean  majesty  or  walks 
a  minuet  with  the  Epic  Muse  and  dallies  by  the 
South  wall  with  the  ruddy  nymph  of  gardens." 

Perhaps  it  may  be  said  of  him  that  he  satisfied 
that  greatest  critic  of  all,  his  own  conscience,  and 
lived  up  to  the  only  standard  that  is  of  any  con- 
sequence, that  one  set  up  by  his  own  moral  character 
and  intellect.  If  he  disregarded  that  self-satisfied 
Nemesis,  public  opinion,  he  is  not  to  blame.  If  he 
did  not  look  down  the  vistas  of  the  future  to  meet 
half-way  the  one-sided,  half-ignorant  recriminations 
of  posterity  we  cannot  therefore  write  him  down 
indiff'erent.  To  use  a  meaningless  phrase,  accepted 
by  the  ignorant,  he  had  the  courage  of  his  con- 
victions, whatever  they  were.  A  confession  of  dis- 
appointment  is   the   only   possible   opening  for   the 


24  DEAN   SWIFT 

brimstone-tipped  fingers  of  the  righteous,  with  their 
devil-inspired    maxim,   "  I    told    you    so,"   but   from 
Temple  himself  we  get  no  such  confession.      Lady 
Gifford,  the  constant  companion  of  his  successes  and 
misfortunes,  writes  of  him  :  "  His  political  memories 
were  clouded  by  an  ever-present  sense  of  disappoint- 
ment.    His  humour  had  become  very  unequal  from 
cruel  fits   of  spleen   and   melancholy.      His   temper, 
naturally   bad,   was    kept    in    uneasy   subjection    by 
sheer  force  of  will.     An  exact  observer  of  nice  points 
of  honour,  he  was  ill-apt  to  make  allowances  for  the 
deficiencies  of  others  ;  liable  to  strong  dislikes  which 
he  only  concealed  with  difficulty  ;   and  kind   to   his 
inferiors  solely  because  he  thought  it  his  duty  to  be 
kind  to  all  men.     In  a  word,  a  man  capable  of  making 
a  favourable   impression  on   chance   visitors,  but   a 
trying  companion  to  his  familiars,  and  an  ungracious 
patron  towards  those  unfortunates  who  might  have 
to  stand  to  him  in  the  relation  of  dependents." 

Undoubtedly  his  secretary  found  him  trying,  and 
the  feeling  was  reciprocated,  though  a  sincere  friend- 
ship grew  up  later  between  Swift  and  his  patron. 
Swift  must  have  been  fully  conscious  of  the  irritating 
likeness  between  Temple  and  his  surroundings,  and 
the  complacent  suitability  of  the  creature  to  its 
habitat.  Temple  thus  describes  his  much-loved 
estate  at  Moor  Park  : — 

"  It  lies  on  the  side  of  a  hill  (upon  which  the  house 
stands),  but  not  very  steep.  The  length  of  the  house 
where  the  best  rooms  and  of  most  use  and  pleasure 
are,  lies  upon  the  breadth  of  the  garden.     The  great 


SWIFT  AND   TEMPLE  25 

parlour   opens   into  the   middle  of  a  terrace   gravel 
walk  that  lies   even  with  it,  and  which   may  be,  as 
I  remember  it,  about  three  hundred  paces  long,  and 
broad  in  proportion.     The  border  set  with  standard 
laurels  and  at  large  distances,  which  have  the  beauty 
of  orange  trees  and  flowered  fruit.     From  this  walk 
are  three  descents  by  many  stone  steps,  in  the  middle 
and  at  each  end  into  a  very  large  parterre.     This  is 
divided  into  quarters  by  gravel  walks  and  adorned 
with  two  summer-houses,  and  the  sides  of  the  parterre 
are   ranged   with   two   large   cloisters,   open    to   the 
garden  upon  arches  of  stone,  and  ending  with  two 
other  summer-houses  even  with  the  cloisters,  which 
are  paved  with  stone  and  designed  with  four  walks  of 
shade,  there  being  none  other  in  the  whole  parterre. 
Over   these  two  cloisters   are   two  terraces  covered 
with  lead  and  faced  with  balusters,  and  the  passage 
into  these   two  walks   is   out  of  the     two   summer- 
houses  at   the   end   of  the   first   terrace   walk.     The 
cloister  facing  the  south  is  covered  with  roses,  and 
would  have  been  proper  for  an  orange-house,  and  the 
other   for  myrtles   and  other   more  common  greens, 
and  had,  I  doubt  not,  been  set  for  that  purpose,  for 
this  piece  of  gardening  had  been  then   as  much   in 
vogue  as  it  is  now.     From  the  middle  of  the  parterre 
is  a  descent  by  many  steps  following  on  each  side  of 
a  grotto  that  lies  between  them  (covered  with  lead) 
into  the  lower  gardens,  which  is  all  fruit  trees,  ranged 
about  the  several  quarters  of  a  wilderness  which  is 
very  shady.     The  walks  here  are  all  green,  the  grotto 
embellished   with    figures    of   shell    rock-work    and 


26  DEAN   SWIFT 

water-works.  If  the  hill  had  not  ended  with  the 
lower  garden,  and  the  wall  were  not  bounded  by  a 
common  way  that  goes  through  the  Park,  they  might 
have  added  a  third  quarter  of  all  trees,  but  this  want 
is  supplied  by  a  garden  on  the  other  side  of  the  house 
which  is  all  of  that  sort,  very  wild  and  shady,  and 
adorned  with  rock-work  and  fountains.  This  was 
Moor  Park  when  I  was  first  acquainted  with  it,  and 
the  sweetest  place,  I  think,  that  I  have  seen  in  my 
life,  either  before  or  since,  either  at  home  or  abroad. 
What  it  is  now  I  can  give  little  account,  having 
passed  through  several  hands  that  have  made  great 
changes  in  garden  as  well  as  in  houses,  but  the 
remembrance  of  what  it  was  is  too  pleasant  ever  to 
forget,  and  therefore  I  do  not  believe  to  have  mis- 
taken the  figure  of  it  which  may  serve  for  a  pattern 
to  the  best  gardens  of  our  manner,  and  that  are  most 
proper  for  our  country  and  climate." 

Perhaps  Temple's  standard  of  life  is  best  expressed 
in  his  own  words  :  "  The  measure  of  choosing  well  is 
whether  a  man  likes  what  he  has  chosen,  which,  I 
thank  God,  has  befallen  me,  and  though  among  the 
follies  of  my  life  building  and  planting  have  not  been 
the  least,  and  have  cost  me  more  than  I  have  the 
confidence  to  own,  yet  they  have  been  fully  recom- 
pensed by  the  sweetness  and  satisfaction  of  this 
retreat,  where  since  my  resolution  taken  of  never 
again  entering  into  any  public  employment,  I  have 
passed  five  years  without  ever  going  once  to  town, 
though  I  am  almost  in  sight  of  it,  and  have  a  house 
there,  always  ready  to  receive  me.     Nor  has  this  been 


SWIFT  AND  TEMPLE  2y 

any  sort  of  affectation,  as  some  have  thought  it,  but 
a  mere  want  of  desire  or  humour  to  make  so  small  a 
remove." 

He  takes  a  gently  satirical  view  of  life  :  "  When  all 
is  done,  human  life  is,  at  the  greatest  and  the  best, 
but  like  a  froward  child,  that  must  be  played  with 
and  humoured  a  little  to  keep  it  quiet,  till  it  fall  asleep 
and  then  the  care  is  over." 

This  point  of  view,  however,  to  the  seriously 
youthful  mind  of  Swift  must  have  appeared  callous. 
A  mind  must  have  comprehended  in  its  grasp  the 
wide  issues  of  life,  whether  it  be  at  twenty  or  at  fifty, 
to  see  in  it  what  it  really  is,  a  game  of  chance  and 
comedy  of  errors.  Temple  had  done  this,  and  he 
emerged  from  it  the  dignified  semi-philosophical, 
rather  pompous  old  man  of  Moor  Park.  He  was 
sixty  years  of  age  when  Swift  came  to  live  with  him 
in  Surrey,  and,  as  was  natural,  was  surrounded  by  a 
halo  of  political  achievements  and  success  in  the  past. 
His  secretary  could  not  therefore  fail  to  admire  this 
winner  of  victories,  though,  at  the  same  time,  he 
must  have  seen  the  hollowness  of  the  shrine  at  which 
he  was  expected  to  worship. 

After  a  year's  residence  with  the  Temple  family  he 
was  ordered  to  Ireland  for  change  of  air,  and  on 
Temple's  recommendation,  obtained  an  insignificant 
post  from  Sir  Robert  Southwell.  It  appears  that  he 
had  already  begun  to  suffer  from  the  disease  which 
became  to  him  a  perpetual  torment.  In  his  ignorance 
of  all  medical  knowledge  he  ascribed  it  to  eating 
"unripe  fruit."    To   this  date  may  be  ascribed  the 


28  DEAN   SWIFT 

beginning  of  his  pedestrian  liabits.  In  order  to 
obtain  enough  exercise  he  used  to  run  up  and  down 
a  hill  behind  the  house  every  two  hours.  A  year 
sufficed  to  restore  him  to  health,  and  he  returned  to 
Moor  Park.  His  return  to  Moor  Park  was  followed 
by  the  appearance  of  new  life  in  the  chrysalis.  This 
new  life  took  the  form  of  that  discontent  which  by 
the  possessors  of  it  is  called  "  divine."  Whatever  is 
the  source  of  it,  it  generally  denotes  life  in  the 
discontented.  It  is  not  difficult  to  imagine  Temple 
greeting  this  new  element  with  some  alarm.  Pro- 
bably he  took  to  himself  at  this  juncture,  that  privilege 
of  which  the  middle-aged  think  they  have  the  sole 
monopoly,  of  being  rude  to  the  young,  and  acted  as  a 
further  irritant  to  Swift's  already  excited  mind.  The 
life  in  the  household  of  this  cultured  man  of  letters 
with  his  wide  acquaintance  with  the  great  ones  of  the 
world,  after  the  life  as  a  schoolboy  and  the  son  of  an 
obscure  mother  in  sordid  surroundings,  was  enough 
to  effect  a  seismatic  disturbance  in  the  most  common- 
place temperament.  Since  change  of  surroundings 
came  to  Swift  just  at  the  time  when  he  had  begun  to 
realize  his  own  potentialities,  it  was  of  almost  incal- 
culable importance  to  him,  and  guidance  at  this 
juncture  would  have  been  of  invaluable  assistance. 
This  moment  occurs  in  the  lives  of  most  of  us,  and 
its  importance  is  most  frequently  disregarded  by 
those  who  have  in  their  hands  the  shaping  of  youthful 
lives.  Temple  no  doubt  looked  on  it  as  an  aggra- 
vation of  the  disagreeable  qualities  of  his  secretary, 
and  did  not  take  the  trouble  to  discover  its  meaning. 


SWIFT  AND   TEMPLE  29 

He  probably  took  for  granted,  together  with  many 
other  guardians  of  youth,  that  a  moral  somersault 
was  necessarily  bad,  and  acted  on  this  assumption. 
The  moment  of  temperamental  revolution  is,  as  a 
rule,  considered  by  the  orthodox  the  auspicious 
moment  for  planting  a  club-foot  on  the  toe  of  the 
revolutionary.  Needless  to  say  this  is  not  the 
time  for  the  would-be  instructor  to  assert  his  own 
personality. 

Temple,  however,  was  wise  enough  to  recognize 
Swift's  possibilities,  and  recommended  him  to  the 
King,  so  that  when,  in  1692,  Swift  took  his  B.A.  and, 
later,  M.A.  degree,  admitted  ad  etmdetji  from  Hart 
Hall,  Oxford,  there  was  a  definite  stipulation  made 
that  he  should  not  take  Holy  Orders  until  he  received 
a  prebend  from  William,  Temple,  perhaps,  was  slow 
to  further  his  interests.  Swift  certainly  thought  so, 
and  suspected  Temple  of  trying  to  reserve  his  secre- 
tary's attainments  for  his  own  purposes.  He  met 
the  King  twice,  and  the  first  occasion  was  the  time 
of  the  much-repeated  anecdote  of  the  asparagus, 
when  King  William  is  said  to  have  taught  Swift 
the  Dutch  method  of  eating  asparagus,  stalks  and 
all.  This  was  so  much  appreciated  by  the  economical 
mind  of  Swift,  that,  later  in  life,  he  insisted  on  one 
of  his  guests  doing  the  same,  to  the  intense  disgust 
of  the  guest ;  an  instance,  as  the  friend  pointed  out, 
of  Swift's  extraordinary  power  over  the  minds  ot 
others.  His  second  meeting  with  the  King  in  1693 
was  more  important,  though  not  perhaps  fraught 
with  all  the  possibilities  with  which  Swift  credited  it. 


30  DEAN   SWIFT 

Temple  wished  to  influence  the  King  with  regard 
to  the  Triennial  Act  and  sent  his  secretary  to  state 
his  point  of  view.  Swift,  in  spite  of  the  knowledge 
of  history  of  which  he  boasted  later,  was  unable  to 
make  William  accept  his  opinion,  and  returned  to 
Moor  Park  much  disappointed.  Though  he  had  failed 
in  his  mission,  and  it  was  probably  a  great  blow  to 
his  opinion  of  his  own  powers  as  a  diplomatist,  yet 
the  King  at  this  time  promised  him  royal  patronage, 
and  his  visit  gave  him  a  personal  acquaintance  with 
the  court  and  a  sight  of  those  men  and  manners 
which  were  afterwards  to  form  his  daily  environment. 
It  is  possible,  too,  that  he  himself  attracted  some 
attention.  The  contrast  between  the  dignified  fre- 
quenters of  the  court  and  the  raw  country  youth  ot 
whom  we  are  told  "he  was  of  humble  appearance 
and  unpractised  manners,  but  whose  strongly  marked 
features  and  piercing  blue  eyes  indicated  a  nature  of 
no  common  type,"  must  have  caused  some  slight 
sensation,  and  possibly  those  early  characteristics 
of  his  were  remembered  by  those  with  whom  he 
came  in  close  contact  later.  Yet,  though  the  King's 
promises  came  to  nothing,  the  fact  of  the  mission 
was  of  importance  because  it  points  to  Temple's 
increased  appreciation  of  Swift's  services  and  ability. 

From  this  point,  moreover,  dated  Swift's  early 
literary  efforts  of  any  importance,  chief  of  which  were 
an  "Address  to  Sir  William  Temple,"  an  "Ode  to 
King  William,"  and,  later,  a  poem,  "  On  the  Recovery 
of  his  Patron  from  Illness."  These  early  works 
contain  personal  references  and  echo  his  discontent 


SWIFT  AND   TEMPLE  31 

with  his  surroundings  and  the  hopelessness  of  his 
prospects.  He  took,  however,  a  more  decided  step 
in  asking  Temple  for  a  definite  promise  of  support 
in  the  clerical  profession.  This  Temple  declined 
to  give,  for,  as  Sheridan  has  it,  "Sir  William  was 
apprehensive  Swift  would  leave  him,  and  upon  some 
accounts  he  thought  him  a  little  necessary  to  him." 
Besides,  he  could  not  bear  the  thought  of  Swift 
leaving  him  till  he  had  a  corrected  copy  of  all  his 
writings.  The  result  was  a  violent  quarrel  between 
the  secretary  and  patron,  followed  by  Swift's  de- 
parture from  Moor  Park.  Temple,  in  his  fear  of 
losing  him,  offered  him  an  employment  in  the  office 
of  the  Rolls  in  Ireland,  with  about  ;^ioo  a  year. 
Swift  replied  that  "since  he  now  had  an  opportunity 
of  living,  without  being  driven  into  the  Church  for 
maintenance,  he  was  resolved  to  go  to  Ireland  to 
take  Holy  Orders."  He  appealed  to  the  Irish  eccle- 
siastical authorities  for  ordination,  but  found,  to  his 
chagrin,  that  he  must  have  some  sort  of  recommenda- 
tion from  his  former  employer.  His  pride,  therefore, 
had  to  receive  another  fall  in  a  request  to  Temple 
for  a  testimonial  to  his  character.  It  would  be 
interesting  to  compare  the  two  documents,  the  one 
written  four  years  earlier  to  Sir  Robert  Southwell, 
and  the  other  written  at  the  close  of  this  period  of 
residence  in  the  Temple  household.  Temple  seems 
in  this  case  to  have  been  thoroughly  sincere  in  his 
support  of  his  secretary,  for  Swift  was  admitted  for 
ordination,  and  presented  by  Lord  Capel  to  the 
prebend   of   Kilroot  near   Belfast,  a  small  and  very 


32  DEAN   SWIFT 

dull  country  living  worth  ;^ioo  a  year.  This  episode 
is  perhaps  typical  of  the  whole  of  Swift's  later  career. 
His  policy  of  waiting  for  favour  and  promotion  was 
never  followed  by  favourable  results.  It  was  only 
when  he  took  matters  into  his  own  hands  that  he 
obtained  what  he  wanted.  His  own  effort  was  fol- 
lowed by  success  in  this  case  as  in  others.  Yet, 
though  he  had  ostensibly  achieved  what  he  wanted, 
he  was  not  yet  satisfied.  He  found  the  life  in  the 
country  intolerably  dull  after  his  life  at  Moor  Park. 
Intercourse  with  the  political  world  was,  pehaps,  life 
to  him.  Ambition,  which  was  frequently  of  necessity 
at  war  with  his  devotion  to  the  Church  and  his 
recognition  of  his  clerical  office,  began  now  to  assert 
its  sway.  His  confession  to  Pope,  though  possibly 
ironical,  yet  was,  to  some  extent,  true:  "All  my 
endeavours  from  a  boy  were  only  for  want  of  a  title 
and  fortune,  that  I  might  be  used  like  a  lord  by  those 
who  have  an  opinion  of  my  parts."  He  became  dis- 
satisfied with  the  country  life.  Moreover,  he  was 
disappointed  in  a  more  romantic  way.  He  received 
a  temporary  rebuff  in  a  love  affair,  which  had  now 
been  of  some  duration.  Miss  Waring,  or  "Varina" 
as  he  called  her,  was  the  sister  of  a  college  friend 
of  his,  and  she  had  hitherto  shown  a  good  deal  of 
affection  for  him.  He  had  found  her,  in  fact,  a  con- 
solation for  the  deprivation  of  the  society  of  Miss 
Betty  Jones  of  Leicester,  who  had  won  his  earliest 
affections.  He  and  Miss  Waring  ;had  gone  so  far 
as  to  agree  to  marriage,  when  Swift's  prospects 
should  improve.     It   appears  that   the   lady  became 


SWIFT  AND   TEMPLE  33 

impatient  at  this  juncture,  and  an  impassioned  corre- 
spondence was  the  result.  Swift,  the  cold-hearted, 
swore  an  eternal  love  for  her,  and  apparently  offered 
to  sacrifice  everything  for  her  sake.  She,  however, 
was  obdurate,  and  we  cannot  help  feeling  dis- 
appointed that  Swift's  first  and  only  inamorata  was 
a  lady  of  so  mercenary  a  disposition  that  she  could 
now  decline  to  encourage  him  because  of  his  lack  of 
prospects,  and  later,  when  promotion  was  granted 
to  him,  she  could  offer  herself  as  his  wife.  Perhaps, 
therefore,  we  cannot  pity  her  for  the  stern  yet 
tasteless  rebuke  which  was  administered  to  her  later 
by  her  former  lover. 

A  year  after  the  presentation  to  Kilroot,  the  death 
of  Lady  Temple  deprived  her  husband  of  a  constantly 
sympathetic  companion.  Her  loss,  perhaps,  caused 
him  to  realize  in  himself  the  advance  of  years  and  the 
need  of  some  support,  for  he  wrote  to  Swift  inviting 
him  to  come  back  as  a  companion  and  secretary. 
This  request  was  considered  by  Swift  an  honour,  for 
the  quondam  servant  was  now  to  be  on  a  footing  of 
equality  with  his  former  master.  He  had  no  hesita- 
tion in  accepting,  and  he  now  entered  on  a  new  phase 
of  existence  as  Temple's  chosen  companion  in  his 
literary  projects.  There  is  an  interesting  anecdote, 
told  by  Sheridan,  in  connection  with  Swift's  resigna- 
tion of  his  living.  "  He  (Swift)  said,  that  soon  after 
he  had  come  to  this  determination,  he  was  taking  his 
customary  walk,  and  met  an  elderly  clergyman  riding 
along  the  road.  After  the  usual  salutation  he  fell  into 
discourse  with  him  :  and  was  so  pleased  with  what 

D 


34  DEAN   SWIFT 

passed  between  them,  that  he  invited  him  to  dinner 
and  easily  persuaded  him  to  be  his  guest  for  a  day  or 
two.  During  this  time  Swift  found  that  he  was  a 
man  of  great  simpHcity  of  manners,  good  sense,  some 
learning,  and  unaffected  piety.  And  upon  inquiring 
into  his  circumstances  learned  that  he  had  only  a 
curacy  of  forty  pounds  a  year,  for  the  maintenance  of 
a  wife  and  eight  children.  Swift  lamented  his  situa- 
tion, and  told  him  that  he  had  some  interest  which  he 
would  exert  in  his  behalf,  and  endeavour  to  procure 
him  a  living,  if  he  could  only  lend  him  his  black  mare 
to  carry  him  to  Dublin,  for  Swift  was  not  at  that  time 
possessed  of  a  horse.  The  clergyman  readily  con- 
sented, and  went  home  on  foot,  promising  him  to 
meet  him  at  anytime  he  should  appoint  on  his  return. 
Swift  went  to  town  and  represented  the  poor  curate's 
case  to  his  patron  in  such  strong  terms  as  soon  pre- 
vailed on  him  to  consent  that  Swift's  living  should, 
upon  his  resignation,  which  was  proposed  at  the 
same  time,  be  made  over  to  him.  .  .  .  Swift,  having 
despatched  this  business,  returned  as  soon  as  possible 
to  the  country  and  gave  notice  to  the  old  clergyman 
to  meet  him.  He  found  him  at  his  door  on  his 
arrival,  and  immediately  upon  their  going  into  the 
parlour  put  the  presentation  into  his  hand,  desiring 
him  to  read  it.  Swift  said  that  while  he  was  doing 
so,  he  kept  his  eyes  steadily  fixed  on  the  old  man's 
face,  on  which  the  joy  of  finding  that  it  was  a  pre- 
sentation to  a  living  was  visibly  expressed  :  but  when 
he  came  to  that  part  of  the  writing  which  mentioned 
the  name  of  the  living,  and  found  that  it  was  Swift's 


SWIFT  AND   TEMPLE  35 

own  which  he  had  resigned  in  his  favour,  he  looked 
at  him  for  some  time  in  silence,  with  such  a  mixed 
emotion  of  astonishment  and  gratitude  in  his  counte- 
nance as  presented  to  Swift  one  of  the  most  striking 
pictures  of  the  mind  expressed  in  the  face  that  he  had 
ever  seen,  and  he  said  that  he  never  before  had  felt 
such  exquisite  pleasure  of  mind  as  he  did  that  hour. 
Nor  is  this  to  be  wondered  at,  since  it  was  the  first 
opportunity  he  ever  had  of  letting  loose  that  spirit  of 
generosity  and  benevolence  whose  greatness  and 
vigour,  when  pent  up  in  his  own  breast  by  poverty 
and  dependence,  served  only  as  an  evil  spirit  to 
torment  him." 

Temple  was  at  this  time  engaged  in  taking  an 
active  part  in  the  contest  between  the  Ancients  and 
the  Moderns,  which  had  spread  to  England,  and  he 
had  written  the  "  Essay  on  Ancient  and  Modern 
Learning,"  which,  in  spite  of  a  polished  correctness  of 
style  and  perfection  of  literary  grace,  is  so  full  of 
errors  in  fact  and  judgment  that  it  cannot  be  con- 
sidered important.  The  dispute  has  been  treated  at 
some  length  in  a  later  chapter,  so  that  there  is  no 
need  for  further  reference  here,  than  to  Swift's  active 
partisanship  on  the  side  of  his  patron,  which  resulted 
in  "The  Battle  of  the  Books,"  the  successor  in  his 
literary  achievement  to  the  "  Tale  of  a  Tub,"  which 
was  already  written.  Various  literary  works  were 
produced,  too,  at  this  time  by  Temple's  pen,  chief 
among  which  was  perhaps  his  "  Essay  on  Gardens," 
which  was  an  estimable  production.  His  historical 
works  have  been  voted   as   inaccurate  and   of  little 


36  DEAN   SWIFT 

value  from  the  point  of  view  of  history.  More  need 
not  be  said  of  them.  Temple's  value  as  a  writer  lies 
simply  in  his  polished  style,  careful  diction  and 
clearness  of  thought.  His  works  were  carefully 
edited  by  Swift  after  his  death  in  1699.  His  sole 
recognition  of  his  secretary's  services  was  a  legacy  of 
;^ioo  and  the  posthumous  publication  of  his  work,  a 
legacy  which  meant  five  years'  unceasing  trouble, 
little  profit,  and  constant  disputes  with  Lady  Giffard. 
Swift  apparently  showed  no  bitterness  of  spirit 
against  Temple,  though  at  the  close  of  ten  years' 
service,  having  reached  the  age  of  thirty  years,  he 
had  obtained  no  position  and  had  still  to  make  a  way 
for  himself  into  the  difficult  and  ambiguous  arena  of 
political  advancement.  What  profit  had  these  thirty 
years  been  to  him?  They  had  been  to  him  an 
excellent  preparation  for  his  after-life.  They  had 
provided  for  him  exactly  what  was  most  essential. 
He  had  received  what  every  one  should  be  grateful 
for  until  they  have  reached  this  age,  before  which  no 
one  should  be  allowed  to  enter  the  public  arena ;  he 
had  been  carefully  and  deliberately  kept  in  the  back- 
ground, and  by  a  process,  unpleasant  perhaps  to  a 
domineering  character,  had  been  enabled  to  think,  to 
comprehend  life  with  its  wide  issues,  and  to  plan  out 
for  himself  a  possible  course  of  action  and  method  of 
existence ;  an  opportunity  which  is  absolutely  in- 
valuable to  those  who  wish  to  do  great  work  later. 
If  Society  would  recognize  the  advisability  of  some 
sort  of  Purdah  for  members  of  both  sexes  under 
thirty,  many   difficulties  would  be  avoided,  and  the 


SWIFT  AND   TEMPLE  37 

number  of  unnecessary  societies  would  be  materially 
diminished. 

Swift's  education  had,  to  a  great  extent,  been 
carried  on  on  negative  lines.  He  had  discovered  the 
value  of  strenuousness  and  vigour  by  seeing  the  want 
of  it  in  his  patron.  He  had  imbibed  a  dread  of  lack 
of  principles  and  of  a  definite  aim  in  life.  The 
effeminateness  produced  by  luxury,  the  softness  of 
character  resulting  from  the  enervating  influence  of 
the  perpetual  peace  of  velvety  lawns  and  sunny 
garden  walks,  the  qualities  of  the  political  peacock, 
were  alike  hateful  to  him.  No  wonder  that  truth  and 
sincerity  became  his  ideal,  and,  through  a  lack  of  dis- 
crimination, from  which  his  character  always  suffered, 
the  abuse  of  these  virtues  was  frequently  mistaken 
for  their  use.  He  had  begun  to  understand  the 
grammar  of  politics  and  to  know  how  far  his  own 
ability  tended  in  this  direction.  He  knew  also  the 
undercurrent  of  political  ideals,  if  they  can  be 
dignified  by  this  title.  The  theory  of  the  social  order 
was  familiar  to  him,  the  ways  of  those  whom  he  con- 
sidered his  superiors  were  no  closed  book.  He  had 
had  the  advantage  of  the  society  of  good  women, 
which  was  important  because,  no  doubt,  from  their 
characteristics  he  built  up  the  high  standard  which 
he  always  maintained  for  a  woman  throughout  his 
life.  Not  the  least  important  was  the  friendship 
which  had  been  begun  with  Esther  Johnson,  then  a 
girl  of  fifteen  or  so,  which  will  be  treated  fully  later. 

We  can,   perhaps,   say   of  him   that   he   had   the 
grammar  of  life  at  his  finger-tips  when  he  entered 


38  DEAN   SWIFT 

the  big  school  which  the  majority  enter  when  they 
have  barely  learnt  to  read. 

To  this  period  belongs  a  list  of  somewhat 
eccentric  resolutions,  which  was  found  after  his 
death,  among  Swift's  papers.  It  may  be  as  well 
to  keep  them  in  their  original  form. 

Resolutions  when  I  come  to  be  Old 

1.  Not  to  marry  a  young  woman. 

2.  Not  to  keep  young  company,  unless  they  really 
desire  it. 

3.  Not  to  be  peevish,  or  morose,  or  suspicious. 

4.  Not  to  scorn  present  ways,  or  wits,  or  fashions, 
or  men,  or  war,  etc. 

5.  Not  to  be  fond  of  children. 

6.  Not  to  tell  the  same  story  over  and  over  to 
the  same  people. 

7.  Not  to  be  covetous. 

8.  Not  to  neglect  decency  or  cleanliness,  for  fear 
of  falling  into  nastiness. 

9.  Not  to  be  over  severe  with  young  people,  but 
to  give  allowances  for  their  youthful  follies  and 
weaknesses. 

10.  Not  to  be  influenced  by,  or  give  ear  to, 
knavish  tattling  servants,  or  others. 

11.  Not  to  be  too  free  of  advice,  nor  trouble  any 
but  those  who  desire  it. 

12.  To  desire  some  good  friends  to  inform  me 
which  of  these  resolutions  I  break  or  neglect,  and 
wherein,  and  reform  accordingly. 

13.  Not  to  talk  much,  nor  of  myself 


SWIFT  AND  TEMPLE  39 

14.  Not  to  boast  of  my  former  beauty  or  strength, 
or  favour  with  ladies,  etc. 

15.  Not  to  hearken  to  flatteries,  or  believe  I  can 
be  beloved  by  a  young  woman ;  et  eos  qui  hcereditatem 
captant,  odisse  ac  vitare. 

16.  Not  to  be  positive  or  opinionative. 

17.  Not  to  set  up  for  observing  all  these  rules, 
for  fear  I  should  observe  none. 


CHAPTER  II 
THE  PROSKENION 

LET  us  stand  beside  Swift  as  he  waits  to  be 
admitted  on  to  the  great  stage,  to  which  he 
aspires.  We  see  a  surging  chaos,  the  ele- 
ments of  what  is  to  be  conflicting  with  the  elements 
of  what  has  been.  As  far  as  one  can  apply  the  term 
to  any  period,  the  eighteenth  century  was  an  age 
of  new  things.  Yet  if  any  one  had  yielded  to 
slumber  in  the  days  of  Horace,  and  become  once 
more  awake  in  the  eighteenth  century,  would  he 
have  been  much  astonished  when  he  came  to  under- 
stand English  Society  and  manners?  Possibly  not. 
Philosophers  have  it  that  there  is,  and  can  be, 
nothing  new,  and  one  must  be  struck  by  the  re- 
semblance of  our  society  in  the  eighteenth  century 
to  that  of  the  age  of  Maecenas.  Politically  it  is 
the  age  of  an  oligarchy  of  favourites,  of  the  intel- 
lectual influence  of  women  in  party  politics,  of 
fevered  attempts  of  monarchy  to  assert  a  personality 
which  no  longer  exists.  From  a  literary  point  of 
view  it  is  the  age  of  the  interest  of  man  in  himself. 
Morally,  it  is  the  age  of  superficiality.  Socially, 
it  is  the  age  of  an  intellectual  aristocracy. 

40 


THE   PROSK^NION  41 

It  was  no  wonder,  then,  that  a  young  man  of 
Swift's  ambition  determined  to  enter  the  arena  where 
he  saw  that  the  laurel  would  be  accorded  to  ability, 
rather  than  to  birth.  The  age  of  the  politician  has 
succeeded  the  age  of  the  courtier,  and  with  this 
comes  the  opportunity  for  those  qualities  which 
pre-eminently  adorn  the  man  in  the  street.  The 
cabal,  with  its  antagonism  between  courtier  and 
politician,  marks  the  transition  stage.  In  Shaftes- 
bury and  Clarendon  we  have  the  politician  qua 
politician.  The  graces  of  the  Stuarts  are  giving 
way  to  the  practical  business  qualities  of  the  House 
of  Hanover;  the  halo  surrounding  monarchy  vanishes 
in  Georgian  powder :  imagination  disappears  with  a 
gasp  of  indignation. 

From  this  period  politics  assume  an  alarming  pro- 
portion in  the  affairs  of  the  day,  and  with  politics 
comes  the  inevitable  cheapening  of  certain  things 
which  hitherto  have  been  valued  at  a  high  rate. 
Literature  must  always  be  the  reflection  of  the  age. 
With  the  beginning  of  party  politics,  of  perpetual 
civil  warfare,  comes  a  new  kind  of  literature,  that 
which  is  based  entirely  on  the  elements  affecting 
human  life,  with  an  intensely  living,  practical  mean- 
ing. It  must  have  in  it  also  the  character  of  that 
speed  which  marks  the  details  of  human  progress, 
leaving  the  slow  growth  of  principles  to  another 
class  of  writers.  An  inevitable  division  comes  in 
the  literary  world,  for  the  writer  of  every  day,  whose 
productions  are  of  merely  transient  value,  has  no 
time  to  add  depth,  or  an  inner  meaning  to  his  work, 


42  DEAN   SWIFT 

which  affects  surfaces  alone.  The  twenty-four  hours 
of  his  day  do  not  suffice  for  metaphysics,  for  pictures, 
for  elegancies  of  style.  His  thoughts  must  not  be 
more  durable  than  the  paper  on  which  they  find 
expression.  Hence  we  have  the  rise  of  journalism. 
Journalism,  as  it  first  appears,  however,  is  on  a 
different  basis,  and  contains  different  elements  from 
those  of  its  later  development.  It  is  a  two-headed 
prodigy,  consisting  on  the  one  side  of  a  class  of 
political  writers  expressing  themselves  in  political 
pamphlets,  who  wish  simply  to  lead  public  opinion  to 
one  party  or  another,  on  the  other,  of  a  class  of  writers 
who  wish  to  affect  public  opinion  in  more  lasting 
matters,  morals,  economics,  and  the  social  order. 
These  find  expression  in  the  newspapers  which 
now,  for  the  first  time,  take  their  place  in  literature. 
The  opinion  of  the  people,  which,  in  our  twen- 
tieth century  is  perhaps  a  Cerberean  hobby-horse, 
begins  to  have  its  value  in  the  eighteenth  century, 
and  is  to  be  guided,  as  far  as  may  be ;  won,  it 
must  be. 

Hence  we  have  a  period  of  intensely  human 
interest,  of  active  literary  and  political  gossip.  It 
is  not  3^et  the  age  of  great  conversationalists,  nor 
of  letter  writers,  but  everyday  gossip  is  glorified 
into  a  system.  The  coffee-house  becomes  the  centre 
of  literary  and  political  interest.  Here  we  have  the 
regular  meetings  of  the  wits  of  the  age,  of  the 
shining  lights  of  the  political  world,  of  those  writers 
who  find  in  these  everyday  meetings  excellent  copy 
for  their  newspaper  articles.      Surely  Addison   and 


THE   PROSKfiNION  43 

Steele  found  in  some  of  the  regular  frequenters  of 
either  Moll's  or  Will's  coffee-house,  the  models  for 
some  of  their  world-famed  characters  in  the  Spectator. 
It  is  no  great  step  from  the  regular  meetings  at  these 
popular  houses  to  the  more  definitely  organized 
club,  and  of  these  many  grew  up  in  quick  succession, 
as  the  Kit  Kat  Club,  the  October  Club,  and  later, 
the  Brother's  Club.  Some  of  these  had  more  definite 
political  interest  than  others,  but  all  served  the  im- 
portant purpose  of  disseminating  the  news  of  the 
day,  whether  political  or  personal. 

From  the  point  of  view  of  parties  they  were 
significant,  for  some  were  frequented  by  Whigs, 
others  by  Tories.  Any  would-be  politician  had  by 
means  of  these  every  facility  for  hearing  discussed 
the  imminent  questions  of  the  hour,  and  could  form 
his  opinion  on  them.  Here  politicians  made  their 
debut  before  entering  the  great  political  world,  and 
when  once  they  had  gained  the  entrie  of  a  circle, 
they  heard  all  the  public  gossip,  learnt  the  trend  of 
affairs,  and  acquired  the  grammar  of  statesmanship. 
As  regular  meeting-places  they  were  the  means  of 
cementing  friendships,  and  probably  many  of  the 
celebrated  men  of  this  half  of  the  eighteenth  century 
looked  back  with  gratitude  to  one  or  other  of  these 
coffee-houses  as  the  birthplace  of  many  a  lifelong 
friendship.  Though  it  is  possible  that  we,  feeling 
the  need  of  some  such  institutions  in  our  day,  have 
overestimated  their  importance,  yet  it  must  be 
admitted  that  they  supplied  a  much-felt  want.  That 
they   were    invaluable   for  writers   there   can   be   no 


44  DEAN    SWIFT 

doubt.  In  many  cases  they  served  the  purpose  which 
is  served  now  by  the  reviewer  or  critic.  Here  the 
author  of  works  lately  come  out,  and  books  were 
then  frequently  produced  anonymously,  could  hear 
the  general  opinion  of  his  work.  Literary  subjects 
received  free  discussion.  In  one  or  other  of  these 
houses  Swift  heard  his  works  talked  about,  and  great 
must  have  been  his  amusement  on  hearing  the  fruits 
of  his  labours  ascribed  to  others,  often  to  quite  un- 
suitable authors.  Introductions  to  men  of  importance 
in  the  literary  world  were  thus  easily  obtainable, 
and  though  perhaps  facility  was  given  for  literary 
charlatanism,  those  opportunities  could  not  have 
been  greater  than  they  are  now.  Addison  and  his 
"little  senate"  have  been  handed  down  to  ridicule 
by  Pope's  criticism,  but  we  are  tempted  to  think  that 
by  this  means  the  eighteenth  century  was  saved 
the  publication  of  books  of  maxims  and  personal 
opinions,  for  the  literary  mind  must  in  some  way 
express  its  interest  in  itself  Moreover  untrammelled 
discussion  of  literary  work  and  projects  among  a 
sympathetic  audience,  bent  on  similar  pursuits,  must 
have  been  no  small  factor  in  the  literary  output  of 
the  day.  Undoubtedly  it  must  have  been  instru- 
mental in  the  origin  of  the  newspapers,  the  Spectator^ 
Tatler,  etc.,  as  the  names  imply. 

Thus  an  introduction  to  one  of  these  literary 
circles  implied  an  introduction  to  the  whole  of  the 
literary  world,  and  for  the  most  part  of  the  political 
one.  Society  was  much  smaller  than  it  is  now,  the 
circle    narrower,    and    though    social    barriers   were 


THE   PROSKENION  45 

firml3^  fixed,  and  the  division  between  the  classes 
more  marked,  yet  there  was  greater  facility  of 
entrance  to  the  inner  shrine.  Journalistic  ability 
admitted  to  the  political  world  through  literary 
circles,  and  the  political  world  admitted  to  the  Court. 
Here  again  in  the  narrow  circle  of  the  Court  world 
there  was  room  for  abilit}'.  Perhaps  half  the  group 
round  the  Queen  was  composed  of  rising  men.  Here 
again  the  transition  from  the  house  of  Stuart  to  that 
of  Hanover  was  clearly  seen.  Swift  with  his  daring 
bluntness,  lacking  all  the  courtesies  of  life,  was 
admitted.  Addison,  Harle}',  Steele  and  many  others, 
claiming  a  right  of  way  purely  by  their  ability  reached 
the  height  of  their  ambition.  It  is  perhaps  the  in- 
evitable consequence  of  government  by  a  woman. 
Stern  fighting  qualities  appeal  most  to  the  woman's 
mind  and  not  the  characteristics  which  are  essentially 
those  of  the  courtier. 

The  Queen  is  an  interesting  figure  of  her  time. 
Her  devotion  to  the  Church  is  signalized  by  the 
benefaction  known  as  Queen  Anne's  Bounty  which 
meant  a  relinquishment  of  a  large  proportion  of  her 
income.  She  was  endowed  with  all  the  spirituality 
of  the  Stuarts,  and  yet  her  personal  economies  and 
almost  parsimonious  tendency  suggest  the  shop- 
keeping  spirit  of  her  successors.  Hers  was  an 
essentially  domestic  government.  The  priest  and 
ph^'sician  held  their  own  with  the  politician  and 
courtier.  Obstinacy  in  some  cases  was  allowed  to 
over-rule  the  saving  common-sense  and  prudence 
which  for  the  most  part  characterized  her,  and  thus 


46  DEAN    SWIFT 

Swift's  so-called  attack  on  the  Church  in  the  "Tale 
of  a  Tub,"  of  which  she  failed  to  see  the  true  import, 
was  enough  to  prevent  her  from  recognizing  and 
rewarding  his  life-long  service  to  that  religious 
foundation  of  which  he  was  as  keen  a  supporter  as 
she  was  herself.  Undoubtedly,  however,  another 
element  entered  in  here.  The  Queen  was  influenced 
to  a  great  extent  by  a  succession  of  women  favourites, 
and  Swift  in  his  poem  "The  Windsor  Prophecy"  had 
attacked  the  Duchess  of  Somerset,  who  at  that  time 
was  the  reigning  power.  This  was  enough,  and  an 
opinion  of  Swift,  never  to  be  eradicated,  was  im- 
planted in  the  Queen's  mind  by  the  enraged  Duchess. 
With  a  Queen  on  the  throne  the  influence  of  women 
tends  to  become  paramount,  and  this  was  especially 
the  case  in  the  reign  of  Anne.  While  in  previous 
ages  the  effect  of  women  on  politics  had  been  the 
indirect  result  of  personal  beauty,  it  now  became 
the  direct  result  of  women's  interest,  arising  from 
their  intellectual  fitness  to  take  their  part  in  business 
involving  wide  issues. 

With  the  age  of  Anne  we  have  the  beginning  of  an 
entirely  new  type  of  woman,  the  intellectual  woman, 
who  concerns  herself  in  politics  and  expresses  her 
opinion  of  them  and  other  things  in  writing:  there  is 
a  small  circle  of  letter-writers,  including  Lady  Mary 
Wortley  Montague,  Mrs.  Delany,  and  Mrs.  Manley, 
who  also  writes  political  satire,  an  unusual  weapon 
in  the  hands  of  a  woman.  The  excess  of  a  virtue 
must  inevitably  ensue  in  this  case  as  in  all  others, 
and    there    is    even    now    some    suspicion    of    the 


THE   PROSK^NION  47 

blue-stocking    element,   though   there   is   as  yet   no 
real  danger  to  be  feared. 

Besides  the  small  number  of  intellectual  women 
there  is  a  set  of  women  of  great  social  importance, 
the  Duchess  of  Marlborough,  Duchess  of  Somerset, 
and  Mrs.  Masham,  and  of  less  importance,  though  of 
greater  social  influence,  Lady  Betty  Berkeley,  Lady 
Betty  Germaine,  and  others.  Besides  these  there  was  , 
a  smaller  circle  of  women  who  held  the  stage  by 
their  beauty  alone,  women  sometimes  of  humble 
birth,  the  toasts  of  the  Clubs,  among  whom  was  Mrs. 
Anne  Long,  and  probably  Esther  Vanhomrigh. 

To  these  various  circles  Swift,  by  degrees,  gained 
the  entree,  and  to  him,  probably,  other  ladies  besides 
Esther  Vanhomrigh  owed  their  education.  Swift's 
position  among  them  was  perhaps  unique  in  those 
days,  though  common  enough  in  our  own  time.  We 
are  inclined  to  forget  the  existence  of  his  priestly 
orders  until  a  reason  is  required  to  account  for  his 
untrammelled  friendship  with  women.  As  a  friend  of 
Mrs.  Vanhomrigh  he  gained  the  entree  to  her  house- 
hold, as  chaplain  to  the  Berkeley  family  he  became 
acquainted  with  Lady  Betty  Berkeley  and  her  intimate 
friends  ;  for  the  rest  priestly  orders  and  a  bullying 
disposition  probably  accounted  for  his  circle  of  woman 
worshippers.  Many  little  anecdotes  are  told  of  his 
intercourse  with  women.  Perhaps  little  trust  maybe 
placed  in  these,  though  we  are  inclined  to  believe  the 
story  of  Swift's  compelling  one  lady  to  sing  in  spite 
of  tears  and  protestation.  He  was  no  doubt  looked 
upon  by  the  husbands  of  many  society  beauties  as  a 


48  DEAN    SWIFT 

salutary  educational  force,  for  he  was  allowed  to  exact 
a  submission  which  would  in  no  way  have  been 
granted  to  the  husbands,  and  the  most  palpable 
rudeness  on  the  part  of  Swift  was  passed  over, 
almost  rejoiced  in.  An  extraordinary  psychological 
perception  enabled  him  to  place  his  finger  on  the 
weak  spot  in  the  character  of  his  women  friends,  and 
they  must  perforce  know  themselves  beaten  from  the 
first  hour  of  their  acquaintance  with  him.  In  only 
one  instance,  that  of  Esther  Vanhomrigh,  did  his 
treatment  fail,  though,  on  the  other  hand,  probably 
neither  to  her  nor  to  Stella  did  he  pose  as  the  over- 
bearing, almost  brutal  tyrant,  which  was  his  favourite 
character  among  ladies.  Stella's  superiority  necessarily 
commanded  respect,  and  though  Swift  loved  to  play 
with  her  as  with  a  child,  yet  to  her  as  a  woman,  he 
offered  the  unfailing  courtesy  of  a  knight.  He  under- 
stood his  women  friends  as  they  are  seldom  known 
by  men. 

In  this  description  of  Swift  among  the  circle  of 
women  we  are  anticipating,  but  it  was  necessary  to 
point  out  the  characteristics  of  the  society  on  which 
he  was  fully  prepared  to  enter,  without  a  tremor  as  to 
his  own  unfitness,  filled  with  the  courage  lent  by  a 
consciousness  of  power  and  capability  of  achieve- 
ment. Carriere  oiiverte  aux  talents  was  perhaps  the 
keynote  of  this  period.  Swift  had  reached  the  age  of 
thirty-two,  when  a  man  begins  to  understand  his  own 
possibilities,  when  the  emotional  enthusiasm  of  youth 
is  replaced  by  mature  consideration  and  practical  out- 
look on  life :  when  the  mind  begins  to  grasp  in  one 


THE   PROSKtolON  49 

momentary  flash  actualities,  together  with  their  causes 
and  effects.  To  return  to  our  former  metaphor,  he 
resembled  an  enormous  and  shapeless  duckling  in  a 
most  impotent  shell,  and  he  now  stood  forth  with  the 
fragments  of  the  shell,  lying  about  him  in  confusion. 
His  appearance  was  that  of  an  ungainly  and  badly 
dressed  parson,  entirely  deficient  in  manners,  fully 
conscious  of  his  own  superiority  to  the  rest  of  man- 
kind, both  mentally  and  practically ;  possessed  of 
an  intellectual  force,  urged  by  a  moral  impulse  to 
impress  himself  on  the  world.  He  knew,  as  all 
others  possessed  of  a  sense  of  vocation  know,  that 
he  was  necessary  to  his  world  and  that  he  had  been 
given  powers  which  must  be  used  for  the  good  of 
his  fellowmen.  It  is  a  trite  commonplace  that  the 
place  of  each  one  would  be  filled  equally  by  another. 
It  is  certainly  untrue  in  the  case  of  a  man  like 
Swift.  He  was  the  man  for  his  time  and  he  knew 
it,  therefore  he  allowed  the  small  things  of  life  to 
slip  by  unheeded,  while  he  pressed  on  to  the  goal 
which  throughout  his  life  lay  before  him.  He  was 
an  idealist,  as  all  those  who  achieve  must  be,  and 
at  the  end  of  his  life  he  looked  back  and  saw  what 
all  idealists  must  see,  broken  threads,  potsherds, 
glass  burnt  to  blackness  in  the  furnace,  and  like 
others  he  died  dissatisfied.  All  honour  to  his  dis- 
satisfaction. 

On  Sir  William  Temple's  death,  Swift  found 
himself  possessed  of  two  unsubstantial  emoluments, 
a  small  legacy  and  a  promise  of  advancement  from 
the    King.     This    promise  was  not   fulfilled,  and  he 

E 


50  DEAN   SWIFT 

had  perforce  to  accept  the  post  of  chaplain  to  Lord 
Berkeley,  one  of  the  Lord  Justiciars  of  Ireland.  Two 
disappointments  were  to  be  his,  one  of  a  secretary- 
ship and  the  other  of  the  Deanery  of  Derry,  before 
he  received  the  living  of  Laracor  in  Ireland,  which, 
together  with  two  other  livings,  brought  him  an 
income  of  a  little  over  ;^200  a  year :  this  paring  of 
the  lion's  claws  no  doubt  made  his  teeth  the  sharper 
when  he  was  enmeshed  in  the  net  of  a  small  country 
living.  The  internal  rumblings  and  tearing  at  the 
net  must  be  left  to  the  imagination.  It  must  have 
been  intensely  disappointing,  though,  no  doubt 
wiseacres  would  add,  excellent  discipline  for  his 
soul,  to  find  all  his  energies  thus  cramped  and 
limited,  when  he  was  expecting  to  find  an  open 
plain  on  which  to  exhibit  his  full  strength.  That 
his  feelings  were  hurt  we  have  evidence  in  his 
treatment  of  a  lady  at  this  time.  His  course  of 
action  also  points  to  the  fact  that  he  did  not  mean 
domestic  cares  to  fetter  his  movements  when  he 
should  be  at  length  allowed  to  move  in  that  bigger 
world  for  which  he  knew  he  was  intended.  Miss 
Waring  having  heard  that  he  was  in  a  position 
to  marry,  at  once  wrote  to  him  demanding  his 
fulfilment  of  an  earlier  promise.  Probably  Swift 
regarded  this  as  the  climax  to  his  misfortunes.  His 
early  love  for  her  had  entirely  disappeared,  and  his 
character  was  such  that  no  mere  sentiment  would 
be  allowed  to  thwart  his  imperious  will.  His  reply 
was  rude  and  coarse,  and  would  have  effectually 
checked  the  aspirations  of  the  most  devoted  lover. 


THE   PROSK^NION  51 

He  was  thus  free  to  devote  himself  to  the  work 
of  his  parish,  and  this  he  carried  out  with  the  most 
immaculate  punctiliousness.  There  are  a  good  many 
reports  of  practical  jokes  in  connection  with  his 
performance  of  his  duties.  At  Laracor  probably 
he  instituted  the  rigorous  system  which  he  followed 
later  in  the  discharge  of  his  ecclesiastical  duties. 
In  this  he  was  far  in  advance  of  his  time,  and  it 
points  to  a  seriousness  in  his  conception  of  the 
duties  of  a  parish  priest  which  was  quite  out  of 
the  common.  Here  we  have  another  instance  of 
the  extreme  conscientiousness  which  marked  every 
phase  of  his  life.  The  regularity  of  mind  which 
led  him  to  impose  on  himself  the  severest  possible 
system  in  all  his  out-goings  and  in-comings,  moved 
him  to  hold  daily  service  in  ihis  parish  church,  a 
custom  which  he  never  gave  up,  and  to  administer 
the  Sacrament  with  extreme  regularity.  No  detail 
of  his  work  in  connection  with  his  parish  or  church 
was  allowed  to  escape,  and  the  whole  was  sur- 
mounted by  a  most  careful  administration  of  the 
revenues  which  went  through  his  hands,  and  which 
were  in  every  case  managed  in  such  a  way  that 
all  profit  arising  from  this  administration  fell  to  his 
successors  rather  than  to  Swift  himself  That  he 
had  a  very  high  conception  of  the  duties  of  his 
order  is  evident  from  all  his  writings  on  the 
subject  of  the  clergy.  His  "  Letter  to  a  Young 
Clergyman"  is  full  of  the  most  sound  advice 
and  might  be  read  by  clergymen  of  the  present  day 
with    much    profit    both    to    themselves    and    their 


52  DEAN   SWIFT 

parishioners.  It  is  a  significant  fact  that  it  was 
a  question  of  Church  revenues  which  first  brought 
Swift  on  to  the  political  stage,  and  it  is  perhaps 
ilustrative  of  the  whole  of  his  political  outlook.  He 
did  not  allow  his  feeling  of  irritation  to  interfere  with 
his  duties,  though  he  must  again  and  again  have 
thought  with  a  good  deal  of  impatience  of  his 
congregation  of  fifteen,  and  had  he  not  been  endowed 
with  a  saving  sense  of  humour  he  must  have  suffered 
considerable  annoyance  at  the  fate  which  befell 
him,  as  it  befalls  many  country  parsons  of  our  own 
time,  of  reading  the  service  with  his  clerk  as  sole 
audience.  Possibly  the  humorous  side  of  the  affair 
was  sometimes  too  much  for  him.  No  doubt  the  story 
is  a  true  one  of  his  beginning  the  exhortation  with 
the  words  "Dearly  beloved  Roger."  It  is  a  slight 
instance  of  the  faculty,  quite  unrestrained,  of  carrying 
a  joke  to  its  logical  conclusion  sometimes  regardless 
of  taste. 

About  this  time,  at  Swift's  instigation,  Esther 
Johnson  and  her  companion,  Mrs.  Dingley,  followed 
him  to  Ireland.  He  advocated  this  for  financial 
reasons,  though  no  doubt  the  gossips  attributed  it 
to  other  motives,  and  probably  both  Swift  and  Stella 
met  with  some  unpleasantness  in  consequence.  In 
spite  of  this,  however.  Swift  must  have  found  it  a 
considerable  alleviation  of  his  lot,  and  the  bonds  of 
the  friendship,  always  a  close  one,  were  from  this 
time  daily  strengthened  until  more  than  twenty  years 
later  Stella's  untimely  death  brought  to  an  end  the 
intercourse  of  a  lifetime.     The  daily  companionship 


THE   PROSK^NION  53 

with  these  two  ladies  no  doubt  contributed  to  win 
for  Laracor  the  attachment  which  Swift  began  to  feel 
for  it.  It  formed  for  him  what  the  word  "  home  "  now 
implies  for  most  people,  an  occasional  residence  and 
resting-place,  for  his  interests  lay  in  the  wide  field 
of  London  and  the  Court. 

The  termination  of  Varina's  love-affair  followed 
closely  on  Swift's  appointment  as  chaplain  to  the 
Berkeley  family.  His  connection  with  them  has 
been  immortalized  by  two  productions,  "The  Medi- 
tation on  a  Broomstick "  and  the  "  Petition  of  Mr. 
Frances  Harris."  The  latter  of  these,  which  was 
developed  later  into  "  Advice  to  Servants,"  is  a 
masterpiece  in  its  expression  of  the  psychological 
understanding  of  the  servant's  mind.  There  is  an 
interesting  and  amusing  story  in  connection  with 
the  former,  told  by  Sheridan.  "  In  the  yearly  visits 
which  he  (Swift)  made  to  London  during  his  stay 
there,  he  passed  much  of  his  time  at  Lord  Berkeley's, 
officiating  as  chaplain  to  the  family,  and  attending 
Lady  Berkeley  in  her  private  devotions.  After  which 
the  doctor,  by  her  desire,  used  to  read  her  some 
moral  or  religious  discourse.  The  Countess  had  at 
this  time  taken  a  great  liking  to  Mr.  Boyle's  Medita- 
tions, and  was  determined  to  go  through  them  in 
that  manner :  but  as  Swift  had  by  no  means  the  same 
relish  for  that  kind  of  writing  which  her  ladyship 
had,  he  soon  grew  weary  of  the  task :  and  a  notion 
coming  into  his  head,  resolved  to  get  rid  of  it  in  a 
way  which  might  occasion  some  sport  in  the  family ; 
for  which  they  had  as  high  a  relish  as  himself     The 


54  DEAN   SWIFT 

next  time  he  was  employed  in  reading  one  of  these 
Meditations,  he  took  an  opportunity  of  conveying 
away  the  book  and  dexterously  inserted  a  leaf,  on 
which  he  had  written  his  own  '  Meditations  on  a 
Broomstick ' :  after  which  he  took  care  to  have  the 
book  restored  to  its  proper  place,  and  in  his  next 
attendance  on  my  lady,  when  he  was  desired  to 
proceed  to  the  next  Meditation,  Swift  opened  upon 
the  place  where  the  leaf  had  been  inserted,  and 
with  great  composure  of  countenance  read  the  title 
*A  Meditation  on  a  Broomstick.'  Lady  Berkeley,  a 
little  surprised  at  the  oddity  of  the  title,  stopped  him, 
repeating  the  words  '  "  A  Meditation  on  a  Broom- 
stick ! "  Bless  me,  what  a  strange  subject !  But  there 
is  no  knowing  what  useful  lessons  of  instruction  this 
wonderful  man  may  draw  from  things  apparently  the 
most  trivial.     Pray  tell  us  what  he  says  about  it.' 

"Swift  then,  with  an  inflexible  gravity  of  counte- 
nance, proceeded  to  read  the  Meditation,  in  the  same 
solemn  tones  which  he  had  used  on  delivering  the 
former.  Lady  Berkeley,  not  at  all  suspecting  a  trick, 
in  the  fulness  of  her  prepossession,  was  every  now 
and  then,  during  the  reading  of  it,  expressing  her 
admiration  of  this  extraordinary  man,  who  could 
draw  such  fine  moral  reflection  from  so  contemptible 
a  subject :  during  which,  though  Swift  must  have 
been  inwardly  not  a  little  tickled,  yet  he  maintained 
a  most  perfect  composure  of  features,  so  that  she  had 
not  the  least  room  to  suspect  any  deceit.  Soon  after, 
some  company  coming  in.  Swift  pretended  some 
business,   and    withdrew,   foreseeing  what    was    to 


THE   PROSK^NION  55 

follow.  Lady  Berkeley,  full  of  the  subject,  soon 
entered  upon  the  praises  of  those  heavenly  Medita- 
tions of  Mr.  Boyle.  '  But,'  said  she,  '  the  doctor  has 
been  just  reading  one  to  me,  which  has  surprised  me 
more  than  all  the  rest.'  One  of  the  company  asked 
which  of  the  Meditations  she  meant.  She  answered 
directly  in  the  simplicity  of  her  heart,  '  I  mean  that 
excellent  "Meditation  on  a  Broomstick."'  The  com- 
pany looked  at  each  other  with  some  surprise,  and 
could  scarce  refrain  from  laughing.  But  they  all 
agreed  that  they  had  never  heard  of  such  a  Medita- 
tion before. 

"  '  Upon  my  word,'  said  my  lady,  'there  it  is  ;  look 
into  that  book,  and  convince  yourselves.'  One  of 
them  opened  the  book,  and  found  it  there  indeed,  but 
in  Swift's  handwriting,  upon  which  a  general  burst 
of  laughter  ensued,  and  my  lady,  when  the  first 
surprise  was  over,  enjoyed  the  joke  as  much  as  any 
of  them,  saying,  '  What  a  vile  trick  has  that  rogue 
played  me!  But  it  is  his  way,  he  never  balks  his 
humour  in  anything.'  The  affair  ended  in  a  great 
deal  of  harmless  mirth,  and  Swift,  you  may  be  sure, 
was  not  asked  to  proceed  any  farther  in  the  Medita- 
tions." It  is,  perhaps,  one  of  his  finest  short  pieces, 
and  may  be  inserted  here. 

"This  single  stick,  which  you  now  behold  in- 
gloriously  lying  in  that  neglected  corner,  I  once 
knew  in  a  flourishing  state  in  a  forest ;  it  was  full  of 
sap,  full  of  leaves  and  full  of  boughs ;  but  now,  in 
vain  does  the  busy  art  of  man  pretend  to  vie  with 
nature,  by  tying  that  withered  bundle  of  twigs  to  its 


56  DEAN   SWIFT 

sapless  trunk.  It  is  now,  at  best,  but  the  reverse  of 
what  it  was,  a  tree  turned  upside  down,  the  branches 
on  the  earth,  and  the  root  in  the  air.  It  is  now 
handled  by  every  dirty  wench,  condemned  to  do  her 
drudgery,  and  by  a  capricious  kind  of  fate  destined 
to  make  her  things  clean  and  be  nasty  itself.  At 
length,  worn  out  to  the  stumps  in  the  service  of  the 
maids,  it  is  thrown  out  of  doors,  or  condemned  to 
the  last  use,  of  kindling  a  fire.  When  I  beheld  this, 
I  sighed,  and  said  within  myself,  surely,  mortal  man  is 
a  broomstick  !  Nature  sent  him  into  the  world  strong 
and  lusty,  in  a  thriving  condition,  wearing  his  own 
hair  upon  his  head,  the  proper  branches  of  this 
reasoning  vegetable,  until  the  axe  of  interference 
has  lopped  off  his  green  boughs,  and  left  him  a 
withered  trunk  :  he  then  flies  to  art,  and  puts  on  a 
periwig,  valuing  himself  upon  an  unnatural  bundle  of 
hairs,  all  covered  with  powder,  that  never  grew  upon 
his  head  ;  but  now,  should  this  our  broomstick  pretend 
to  enter  the  scene,  proud  of  those  birchen  spoils  it 
never  bore,  and  all  covered  with  dust,  though  the 
sweepings  of  the  fairest  lady's  chamber,  we  should 
be  apt  to  ridicule  and  despise  its  vanity.  Partial 
judges  that  we  are  of  our  own  excellencies,  and  other 
men's  defaults ! 

"  But  a  broomstick,  perhaps  you  will  say,  is  an 
emblem  of  a  tree  standing  on  its  head  ;  and  pray, 
what  is  man  but  a  topsy-turvey  creature,  his  animal 
faculties  perpetually  mounted  on  his  rational,  his 
head  where  his  heels  should  be,  grovelling  on  the 
earth,  and  yet,  with  all  his  faults,  he  sets  up  to  be  an 


THE   PROSK^NION  57 

universal  reformer  and  corrector  of  abuses,  a  remover 
of  grievances,  rakes  into  every  street  corner  of 
nature,  bringing  hidden  corruptions  to  the  light,  and 
raises  a  mighty  dust  where  there  was  none  before, 
sharing  deeply  all  the  while  the  very  same  pollution 
he  pretends  to  sweep  away :  his  last  days  are  spent 
in  slavery  to  women,  and  guarding  the  least  deserv- 
ing :  till  worn  to  the  stumps  like  his  brother  besom, 
he  is  either  kicked  out  of  doors,  or  made  use  of  to 
kindle  flames  for  others  to  warm  themselves  by." 

Lady  Berkeley  and  her  daughter  were  always  firm 
friends  of  Swift,  though  from  Lord  Berkeley  perhaps 
he  received  less  kindly  treatment.  Yet  the  connec- 
tion with  this  family  proved  very  useful  to  him,  for 
he  thereby  received  introductions  to  two  important 
people,  the  Duke  of  Ormond,  Lord-Lieutenant  of 
Ireland,  whose  daughter,  afterwards  Lady  Ashburn- 
ham,  became  a  great  friend  of  his,  and  Lord  Pem- 
broke, who  succeeded  the  Duke  of  Ormond.  In  1701 
Swift  took  the  degree  of  Doctor  of  Divinity  at  Trinity 
College,  Dublin,  and  a  few  months  later  went  with 
the  Berkeley  family  to  England.  From  this  time, 
perhaps,  dated  the  fascination  which  London  had  for 
him  throughout  his  life.  In  the  visit  which  he  had 
paid  to  the  Court  as  Sir  William  Temple's  secretary 
had  no  doubt  originated  his  love  for  London,  but 
from  now  the  city  became  the  mistress  of  his  soul,  his 
steps  turned  thither  involuntarily,  and  compulsory 
absence  was  looked  upon  as  exile.  The  metropolis  in 
our  day,  with  its  seething  populace  and  strong  human 


58  DEAN   SWIFT 

interest,  has  its  fascination  for  the  practical  soul,  and 
it  no  doubt  had  a  similar  attraction  for  Swift,  though 
perhaps  the  Court,  where  the  affairs  of  Kings  and  the 
great  were  at  stake,  formed  his  true  centre.  His 
pleasure  lay  in  guiding  the  actions,  not  the  souls  of 
men,  and  the  ambition,  which  was  inherent  in  him, 
though  kept  under  strong  control,  found  here  a 
satisfactory  playground. 

About  this  time  he  obtained  through  Congreve, 
an  old  school-fellow,  the  entree  to  the  literary 
political  society  in  which  he  was  meant  to  be  a  leader. 
It  served  him,  moreover,  as  a  stepping-stone  to  the 
great  world  to  which  he  aspired.  As  the  "  mad 
parson  "  he  first  attracted  notice  in  the  coffee-houses. 
Sheridan  tells  an  interesting  anecdote.  "The  knot  of 
wits  used  all  this  time  to  assemble  at  Button's  coffee- 
house, and  I  had  a  singular  account  of  Swift's  first 
appearance  there  from  Ambrose  Phillips,  who  was 
one  of  Mr.  Addison's  little  senate.  He  said  that  they 
had  for  several  successive  days  observed  a  strange 
clergyman  come  into  the  coffee-house,  who  seemed 
utterly  unacquainted  with  any  of  those  who  fre- 
quented it,  and  whose  custom  it  was  to  lay  his  hat 
down  on  a  table,  and  walk  backward  and  forward  at  a 
good  pace  for  half  an  hour  or  an  hour  without  speak- 
ing to  any  mortal  or  seeming  in  the  least  to  attend  to 
anything  that  was  going  forward  there.  He  then 
used  to  take  up  his  hat,  pay  his  money  at  the  bar  and 
walk  away  without  opening  his  lips.  After  having 
observed  this  singular  behaviour  for  some  time,  they 
concluded  him  to  be  out  of  his  senses ;  and  the  name 


THE   PROSKtolON  59 

that  he  went  by  among  them  was  the  *  mad  parson.' 
This  made  them  more  than  usually  attentive  to  his 
motions,  and  one  evening  as  Mr.  Addison  and  the 
rest  were  observing  him,  they  saw  him  cast  his  eyes 
several  times  on  a  gentleman  in  boots,  who  seemed 
to  be  just  come  out  of  the  country,  and  at  last  ad- 
vanced towards  him  as  intending  to  address  him. 
They  were  all  eager  to  hear  what  this  dumb  mad 
parson  had  to  say,  and  immediately  quitted  their 
seats  to  get  near  him.  '  Pray,  sir,'  said  he,  '  do  you 
remember  any  good  weather  in  the  world?'  'Yes, 
sir,'  was  the  reply ;  '  I  thank  God  1  remember  a  great 
deal  of  good  weather  in  my  time."  'That,'  said  Swift, 
'  is  more  than  I  can  say.  I  never  remember  any 
weather  that  was  not  too  hot,  or  too  cold,  or  too  wet, 
or  too  dry,  but,  however  God  Almighty  contrives  it, 
at  the  end  of  the  year  'tis  all  very  well.' " 

No  doubt  this  incident  served  to  give  Swift  an 
introduction  to  the  world  of  wits,  and  it  was  but  a 
slight  step  to  the  world  of  politics. 


CHAPTER   III 
IN   THE   BLAZE  OF  THE   FOOTLIGHTS 

THERE  is  nothing  more  dazzling,  nothing 
which  more  completely  shuts  off  outer  exist- 
ence, than  the  glare  of  the  footlights.  We 
are  inclosed  in  a  small  community  of  our  own  while 
the  bigger  world  can  see  and  criticize  all  our  move- 
ments. Thus  Swift,  moving  in  an  inner  circle  where 
there  were  a  thousand  living  and  virile  elements, 
remained  unconscious  of  that  keen  scrutiny  to 
which  all  his  actions  were  exposed.  We  must  play 
the  part  of  the  spectators,  trying,  as  far  as  may 
be,  to  understand  his  motives  and  consequent 
actions,  remembering  that  the  perspective  is  altered 
for  us,  that  we,  from  our  vantage-ground,  must 
see  things  as  Swift  did  not  see  them.  In  this 
inner  circle,  to  the  threshold  of  which  he  had  just 
achieved  the  entree,  Swift  perceived  everything  that 
he  valued — ecclesiastical  and  political  preferment,  a 
reception  and  practical  use  for  his  literary  talent, 
and  friendship  with  men  of  intellectual  and  moral 
power  equal  to  his  own.  Among  them  were  num- 
bered Congreve,  then  at  the  height  of  his  intellectual 
power  and  achievement ;   Addison,  who   had  so   far 

60 


IN   THE   BLAZE  OF  THE  FOOTLIGHTS    6i 

only  set  foot  on  the  first  rung  of  the  political  ladder ; 
and  Steele,  who  had  only  lately  discovered  that  in 
journalistic  art  lay  his  true  vocation. 

It  is  interesting  to  note  that  Congreve's  services 
were  afterwards  fully  repaid  by  Swift  by  an  intro- 
duction to  Harley  when  Congreve,  his  name  almost 
forgotten  in  the  literary  world,  was  in  reduced  cir- 
cumstances. Congreve,  though  of  Yorkshire  extrac- 
tion, owing  to  his  father's  employment  was  brought 
up  and  educated  in  Ireland,  meeting  Swift  at  the 
Kilkenny  Grammar  School.  The  study  of  law  for 
which  he  was  intended  did  not  appeal  to  him,  and 
after  an  attempt  at  novel-writing  he  tried  dramatic 
work.  The  Old  Bachelor,  his  first  play,  met  with 
almost  unparalleled  success  and  secured  for  him  a 
Government  post.  The  flame  of  genius  quickly  blazed 
and  as  quickly  died.  The  course  of  his  dramatic 
success  was  short,  for  his  last  play,  The  Way  of 
the  World,  was  acted  just  eight  years  after  his 
first,  and  from  that  time,  though  only  a  little  over 
thirty,  he  remained  a  hanger-on  in  the  literary  world. 
At  the  same  time  he  was  regarded  as  a  final  autho- 
rity in  things  literary,  and  received  the  homage  of 
the  young  writers  of  the  day.  The  controversy  with 
Collier,  in  which  Congreve  conducted  a  vigorous 
defence  of  the  stage,  had  done  much  to  strengthen 
his  authority  and  position.  No  doubt  many  of  the 
literary  beginners  looked  on  Congreve  as  their  father 
in  Apollo,  for  his  maturity  was  an  early  one ;  Steele 
made  him  patron  of  his  "  Miscellany,"  and  Pope  in- 
scribed to  him  his  "Translation  of  the  Iliad."     Like 


62  DEAN   SWIFT 

others,  however,  Congreve  was  led  away  from  the 
shrine  of  the  dramatic  Muse  to  the  temple  of 
practical  politics,  and  ended  in  gentle  dabbling  what 
might  have  been  a  brilliant  career.  He  always 
remained  in  favour  with  the  Whigs,  without  assum- 
ing a  hostile  attitude  to  the  Tories,  but  naturally^ 
he  met  with  little  reward  for  so  lukewarm  an 
advocacy.  Dr.  Johnson  with  the  utmost  scorn  tells 
us  that  Congreve  treated  the  Muses  with  ingratitude, 
and  accuses  him  of  the  weakness  which  to  that 
worthy  would  be  the  lowest  depth,  of  wishing  to 
be  considered  a  gentleman  rather  than  a  man  of 
learning.  The  full  meaning  of  this  accusation  is 
understood  by  those  fully  versSQ  in  eighteenth- 
century  manners  and  customs,  where  the  names 
"gentleman"  and  "wit"  were  mutually  exclusive 
terms.  Congreve's  career,  for  its  extraordinary 
promise  and  premature  decay,  was  remarkable.  It 
is  unnecessary  to  comment  further  on  it;  he  is  of 
importance  here  solely  as  the  medium  of  Swift's 
introduction  to  politics,  and  as  one  more  example 
of  Swift's  widespread  benevolence  and  unfailing 
gratitude  for  services  rendered  to  him. 

It  is  interesting,  however,  to  study  his  career  side 
by  side  with  that  of  Addison,  the  most  important  of 
the  circle  round  Swift  at  this  juncture.  He  and 
Congreve  were  dramatically  opposed  ;  Congreve 
brilliant,  unstable,  born  to  momentary  success  which 
he  was  at  no  pains  to  achieve ;  Addison  slow,  pains- 
taking, of  a  plodding  nature,  born  to  a  lasting  success, 
based   on   the   stable    footing   of   perseverance    and 


IN   THE   BLAZE  OF  THE   FOOTLIGHTS    63 

capacity  for  knowing  his  opportunity  and  seizing  it. 
His  career  at  Oxford  was  singularly  successful,  and 
his  reputation  as  a  man  of  letters,  following  on  the 
publication  of  several  works,  chief  of  which  was  his 
account  of  the  greatest  English  poets,  introduced  him 
by  name,  at  any  rate,  to  other  writers.  He  had, 
moreover,  a  capacity,  most  practical  in  its  results, 
of  writing  adulatory  verse,  which  soon  brought  him 
into  favour  with  the  foremost  Whig  politicians  of  his 
time,  Somers  and  Montague.  Their  favour  secured 
for  him  what  was  invaluable  to  a  man  of  his  ability, 
a  pension  of  ;^30o  a  year,  which  enabled  him  to  travel 
for  four  years  and  complete  his  literary  education. 
It  was  lucky  for  him  that  he  had  secured  this  favour 
at  the  hands  of  the  Whigs,  for  on  his  return  to 
England  in  1703,  they  had  been  succeeded  by  the 
Tories,  and  his  fortunes  sank  to  the  lowest  possible 
depth.  His  party's  need  of  some  means  of  centraliza- 
tion found  its  expression  in  the  formation  of  the  Kit 
Kat  Club,  which  consisted  of  thirty-nine  prominent 
Whigs.  Addison  was  elected  member  soon  after  his 
return  to  England,  and  thus  maintained  a  close  con- 
nection with  his  party.  He  was  enabled  shortly 
afterwards  to  further  the  interests  of  the  Whigs  by 
his  poem,  "The  Campaign."  This  resulted  in  his  ap- 
pointment as  Under  Secretary  of  State,  a  post  which, 
however,  on  the  fall  of  the  Earl  of  Sunderland  in  1708, 
was  taken  from  Addison  to  make  room  for  a  Tory 
successor.  He  was  soon  provided  with  other  work, 
as  Secretary  to  Lord  Wharton,  Lord-Lieutenant  of 
Ireland,  and  during  his  tenure  of  this  office  cemented 


64  DEAN   SWIFT 

with  a  firmness  never  to  be  seriously  shaken,  the 
friendship  with  Swift  begun  in  1705,  a  year  after  the 
publication  of  the  "Tale  of  a  Tub." 

To  any  one  studying  Swift  from  a  superficial  point 
of  view,  he  appeared  at  that  time  to  be  wholly  Whig 
in  sympathies,  and  thus  he  and  Addison  met  on 
common  ground  in  politics.  Mutual  respect  alone 
is  the  element  which  gives  stability  to  friendship, 
and  thus  Swift  maintained  for  Addison  a  lasting 
affection  in  spite  of  a  change  of  politics.  To  use 
Swift's  words,  Addison  was  the  "most  honest"  man 
of  his  time;  to  borrow  Addison's  encomium.  Swift 
was  the  "truest  friend,  and  greatest  genius  of  his 
age."  These  are  strong  testimonies  in  the  mouths 
of  perhaps  the  two  most  sincere  characters  of  the 
reign  of  Anne.  Each  probably  was  attracted  by  the 
sincerity  of  the  other,  and  found  in  the  other  an 
intellectual  companion,  though,  no  doubt,  Addison 
often  gazed  open-mouthed  at  the  brilliance  of  the  star 
which  far  outshone  his  own.  Addison's  claim  to 
literary  fame  was  based  on  a  graceful  prose  style 
and  excellency  of  scholarship.  His  dramatic  works, 
Rosamund,  an  opera,  and  Cato,  a  tragedy,  cannot  be 
classed  among  great  dramatic  achievements,  nor  can 
his  poetry  be  seriously  considered.  Both  were 
entirely  lacking  in  originality,  without  which  both 
poetry  and  the  drama  must  be  lifeless  husks.  It  is, 
however,  as  a  journalist  and  originator  of  the  character 
sketch  that  Addison  achieved  distinction.  The 
originality  lies,  perhaps,  in  the  conception  rather  than 
in  the  treatment  of  the  characters  of  the  Spectator. 


IN   THE   BLAZE   OF  THE   FOOTLIGHTS   65 

The  introduction  of  a  personal  element  into  the  Essay 
is  an  entirely  new  feature  of  English  literature,  and 
with  this  the  Essay  begins  to  assume  that  character 
which  remains  its  permanent  attribute  in  its  later 
development  in  the  work  of  Charles  Lamb  and  other 
nineteenth-century  writers.  This  form  of  writing 
has,  moreover,  a  historic  value  in  the  fact  that  it 
forms  the  basis  of  the  character  novel. 

A  period  in  the  life  of  a  nation  which  takes  as  its 
motto,  "The  proper  study  of  mankind  is  Man,"  must 
perforce  find  some  personal  mode  of  expression,  and 
Addison,  happily  for  his  literary  name,  was  the  first 
to  strike  this  note.  Once  more  we  are  compelled  to 
notice  the  depressing  resemblance  between  literature 
and  trade,  that  only  that  man  succeeds  who  strikes 
the  keynote  of  his  century  and  follows  up  the  initial 
victory  in  close  pursuit.  Without  implying  anything 
derogatory  to  Addison's  literary  genius,  this  fact 
must  be  remembered  in  ascribing  to  him  this  great 
achievement.  His  work  receives  sufficient  recog- 
nition in  the  statement  that  those  characters  in  the 
Spectator  were  his  which  will  live  so  long  as  our 
literature  endures,  and  that  it  is  due  to  him  that  the 
characters  whose  author  was  Steele,  were  frequently 
pruned  by  Addison's  more  cultured  hand,  so  that 
they  too  are  a  lasting  monument.  Papers  by  Addison 
also  appeared  in  the  Whig  Examiner.  The  rest  of 
his  work  was  comprised  in  the  Freeholder,  and  other 
Whig  newspapers  which  he  conducted  with  much 
success,  the  Old  Whig,  one  or  two  pamphlets,  and  a 
play,  The  Drummer,  which  met  with  a  cold  reception. 


66  DEAN   SWIFT 

His  political  career  ended  in  an  eleven  months' 
tenure  of  the  Secretaryship  of  State,  which  he  ap- 
parently resigned  with  some  alacrity,  rejoicing  in  the 
leisure  thus  afforded  him  for  literary  work.  His 
death,  however,  occurred  a  year  later  in  1719,  by 
which  the  Government  felt  probably  that  one  of  its 
strongest  and  most  steadfast  supporters  was  removed, 
for  Addison  had  throughout  been  thoroughly  honest 
and  conscientious  to  his  political  convictions.  He 
was  diametrically  opposed  in  character  to  Steele,  who 
was  a  friend  both  of  Addison  and  Swift,  and,  curiously 
enough,  quarrelled  with  both,  being,  no  doubt,  gifted 
with  a  lack  of  stability  not  uncommon  to  the  literary 
character. 

Steele  is  one  of  the  most  fascinating  characters  of 
the  circle.  He  possessed  all  the  charm  and  grace  of 
character  which  Addison  lacked,  except  in  a  literary 
sense.  He  combined  the  courtesy  and  undaunted 
ardour  of  the  military  character  with  the  quick  wit 
and  active  imagination  of  the  literary  genius.  His 
experience  of  life  and  his  own  irregularities,  perhaps 
many  in  number,  made  him  a  sympathetic  companion 
and  writer.  While  Addison's  characters  in  the  Spec- 
tator  were  drawn  from  the  coffee-house,  Steele's  were 
drawn  from  a  wider  world.  His  laughter  is  the 
laughter  of  the  whole  human  race,  and  his  tears 
are  the  tears  shed  by  all  over  common  griefs 
and  failures.  As  a  lover  he  was  perfection,  as  a 
father  ideal,  as  a  husband  he  failed,  merely  through 
a  lack  of  capacity  to  meet  his  bills.  No  one  could 
have  been  more  devoted  to  "  Dear  Prue,"  who,  we 


IN   THE   BLAZE  OF  THE   FOOTLIGHTS    67 

are  tempted  to  think,  must  have  been  most  exacting. 
We  would  linger  over  this  side  of  Steele's  life,  read 
again  and  again  those  charming  love  letters  written 
to  his  wife  after  their  marriage,  hear  once  more 
the  story  of  all  his  little  acts  of  self-denial  to  furnish 
her  with  the  necessities  of  life,  for  he  was  capable 
of  every  form  of  self-denial,  except  one,  the  all- 
necessary  one  of  curbing  his  own  reckless  and 
impulsive  spirit.  Unfortunately  it  is  our  lot  to 
study  Sir  Richard  Steele  the  journalist,  rather  than 
Dick  Steele  the  lover.  It  must  not  be  forgotten 
that  Steele  was  not  the  originator  of  journalism  ; 
that  laurel  must  always  be  given  to  Defoe,  whom 
Steele  succeeded  in  this  branch  of  literature,  though 
to  Steele  must  be  ascribed  the  foundation  of  that 
class  of  newspaper  of  which  the  Taller,  started  in 
1709,  was  the  first  example.  This,  as  its  name 
implies,  was  a  paper  of  a  more  or  less  gossiping 
nature,  in  which  the  doings  of  every  one  were  dis- 
cussed in  a  running  commentary  on  men  and 
manners.  It  had,  of  course,  political  interest,  and 
was  a  useful  vent  to  the  political,  social,  and  moral 
opinions  of  those  who  wrote  for  it.  Addison  contri- 
buted one  or  two  papers,  though  his  best  efforts 
were  reserved  for  the  Speclalor,  a  paper  on  slightly 
different  lines,  which  was  started  by  Steele  in  1711, 
in  immediate  succession  to  the  Taller.  The  Speclalor, 
perhaps  more  than  its  predecessor,  bore  the  cha- 
racter of  censor,  though  at  first  its  criticism  was 
of  a  kindly  nature.  No  more  vivid  picture  of  the 
life  and  morals  of  the  eighteenth  century  is   to  be 


6S  DEAN   SWIFT 

found  anywhere  than  in  the  papers  of  the  Spectator. 
The  censor  assumes  the  character  now  of  a  man 
of  position,  now  a  distressed  lady,  now  the  man 
in  the  street,  and  all  make  their  complaints  in  the 
form  of  correspondence  to  the  paper,  while  the 
censor  also  reserves  to  himself  the  rignt  of  personal 
criticism  in  his  own  character.  The  friends  of  Sir 
Roger  de  Coverley  are  also  allowed  to  make  their 
commentary  under  the  form  of  perhaps  all  the  types 
of  men  frequenting  the  coffee-houses.  Many  of  these 
papers  were  contributed  by  Addison ;  these  are  as 
a  rule  marked  by  a  greater  dignity  and  more  telling 
force  of  style  than  those  of  Steele,  but  it  is  in  the 
pathetic  delineations  of  the  poorer  classes,  of  the 
failures  in  Society,  that  we  recognize  the  hand  of 
Steele.  Addison  frequently  assumed  the  part  of 
literary  critic,  and  some  critical  papers,  then  con- 
sidered valuable,  on  "  Paradise  Lost,"  and  on  Italian 
Opera,  and  other  literary  themes  proceeded  from 
his  pen.  In  the  autobiographical  papers  with  their 
confession  of  weakness,  with  their  expression  of 
unfailing  sympathy  with  human  nature,  and  their 
wonderful  feeling  of  the  joy  of  living,  we  find  Steele. 

Unfortunately  Steele  allowed  himself  to  use  his 
paper  as  a  means  of  recrimination  against  govern- 
ment, and  finding  his  position  consequently  unsafe, 
he  had  to  bring  the  Spectator  to  a  close  amid  uni- 
versal regret  and  sorrow  throughout  England.  The 
Guardian  was  essentially  political  in  character, 
though  in  it  space  was  found  for  lighter  writings, 
such  as  the  poetry  of  Pope  and,  later,  non-political 


IN   THE   BLAZE   OF  THE   FOOTLIGHTS   69 

contributions  by  Addison.  About  this  time  took 
place  the  quarrel  between  Steele  and  Swift,  the 
history  of  which  is  an  unfortunate  story  of  ill- 
justified  recriminations  and  reproaches  on  either 
side.  The  Crisis  succeeded  the  Guardian,  and  im- 
mediately following  the  birth  of  this  paper  came 
the  fall  of  the  Tory  Ministry  coincident  with  the 
death  of  the  Queen.  Steele's  hopes  of  reward  for 
his  Whig  writings  were  but  slightly  repaid  by  the 
new  Government.  The  highest  post  offered  to  him 
during  the  remaining  fourteen  years  of  his  life  was 
that  of  Commissioner  for  Forfeited  Estates  in  Scot- 
land. His  was  not  the  character  to  succeed  finan- 
cially, he  was  too  hot-headed  to  submit  calmly  to 
injury,  too  much  lacking  in  tact  to  try  to  understand 
a  momentary  lapse  of  affection;  altogether  too 
warm-hearted  for  a  cold-hearted  and  scheming  world. 
He  may  be  written  down  as  one  of  the  world's 
failures,  as  one  of  heaven's  successes. 

In  mentioning  Swift's  quarrels  with  two  of  his 
greatest  friends  we  have  of  necessity  anticipated 
his  own  story.  He  had  won  their  friendship  at  first 
purely  on  political  grounds,  by  his  authorship  of 
the  pamphlet  entitled  Discourse  on  the  Dissensions 
in  Athens  and  Rome  in  1701,  which  was  a  protest 
against  the  impeachment,  by  the  Commons,  of  the 
Whig  leaders.  This  secured  him  the  favour  of 
Somers,  Halifax,  and  Sunderland,  though,  as  it 
turned  out,  it  was  a  favour  most  superficial  in  cha- 
racter, fruitless  in  its  results.  Another  opportunity 
occurred  for  his  pen,  in  the  twofold  attempt  to  pass 


70  DEAN   SWIFT 

the  Occasional  Conformity  Bill  against  the  Whigs, 
who  included  for  the  most  part  a  vast  body  of  Dis- 
senters. Swift,  perhaps  fortunately  for  his  position 
at  the  time,  allowed  the  opportunity  to  pass,  and 
the  Bill  was  thrown  out,  leaving  him  still  safely 
installed  as  a  true  Whig.  A  letter  of  his,  written  to 
Dr.  King  in  1703,  throws  light  on  the  state  of  affairs 
at  the  time  : — 

"  I  wish  you  had  been  here  for  ten  days,  during 
the  highest  and  warmest  reign  of  party  and  faction 
that  I  ever  knew  and  read  of  upon  the  Bill  against 
occasional  conformity.  ...  It  was  so  universal,  that 
I  observed  the  dogs  in  the  streets  much  more  con- 
tumelious and  quarrelsome  than  usual ;  and  the  very 
night  before  the  Bill  went  up  (to  the  Lords)  a  Com- 
mittee of  Whig  and  Tory  cats  had  a  very  warm  and 
loud  debate  upon  the  roof  of  our  house.  But  why 
should  we  wonder  at  that,  when  the  very  ladies 
are  split  asunder  into  High  Church  and  Low,  and 
out  of  zeal  for  religion  have  hardly  time  to  say  their 
prayers  ?  " 

Here  was  undoubtedly  scope  for  the  talents  of 
the  politician  and  writer,  and  Swift,  by  the  publica- 
tion of  the  "  Tale  of  a  Tub"  in  1704  finally  asserted 
his  claim  to  a  place  among  the  foremost  writers  01 
his  time.  For  the  next  ten  years  we  see  him  in  the 
forefront  of  the  fray,  raging  like  a  caged  lion  during 
a  temporary  enforced  residence  in  Ireland,  thoroughly 
at  his  ease  amid  the  fighting  crowd,  and  never  more 
gracious  than  when  appealed  to  as  an  adviser,  and 
honoured  as  the  man  who  alone   had  a  voice  with 


IN  THE   BLAZE   OF  THE  FOOTLIGHTS   71 

supreme  authority.  Some  account  must  be  given 
here  of  politics  at  the  beginning  of  the  reign  of 
Queen  Anne,  in  order  that  a  strong  and,  we  hope, 
fair  light  may  be  thrown  upon  Swift  and  his  prin- 
ciples. So  many  charges  have  been  hurled  against 
him  as  turncoat,  so  many  a  sneer  at  him  as  political 
dupe,  so  many  a  jibe  by  the  serious  at  his  want  of 
religion,  that  some  explanation  of  the  truth  under- 
lying all  this  period  full  of  problems  is  undoubtedly 
called  for. 

The  main  distinction  between  Whig  and  Tory 
rested  in  the  support  by  the  Whigs  of  the  Revolution 
and  the  Hanoverian  succession,  and,  on  the  other 
side,  of  the  Tory  upholding  of  the  doctrine  of  Divine 
Right  and  of  the  theory  that  the  ruin  of  the  Church 
meant  the  ruin  of  the  State.  Perhaps,  so  far  as  Swift 
is  concerned,  the  latter  tenet,  that  the  ruin  of  the 
Church  meant  the  ruin  of  the  State,  is  the  most 
important.  It  has  been  well  pointed  out  by  a  recent 
writer  that  there  is  an  essential  difference  between 
the  Reformation  in  Scotland  and  in  England,  In  the 
former  country  you  have  an  attempt  at  the  formation 
of  a  theocracy  which  has  become  familiar  to  us  in  the 
oft-quoted  Miltonian  phrase  that  new  presbyter  is 
but  new  priest  writ  large.  Scotland,  unrepresented 
in  her  Parliament,  had  voiced  her  grievances  in  her 
Church  synods— while  in  England,  where  the  parlia- 
mentary franchise  was  on  a  broader  basis,  the  re- 
ligious questions  were  discussed  in  the  Parliament, 
and  the  result  was  that,  so  far  as  the  English  Church 
was   concerned,  it  became   Erastian.     To   touch  the 


72  DEAN   SWIFT 

Church  therefore  in  the  eighteenth  century  was  to 
upset  the  whole  working  of  the  machinery  of  govern- 
ment, and  to  plunge  the  country  into  that  chaos 
which,  as  the  grandfathers  of  living  men  could 
remember,  had  cost  Charles  I.  his  head  and  had  pro- 
duced the  Revolution  of  1689.  Order  was  essential, 
anything  that  produced  disorder  was  destructive. 
Churchmen  saw  in  Dissent  the  elements  of  disorder, 
for  it  was  allied  with  free  thought,  even  with  atheism, 
and  they  banded  together  under  a  Tory  banner, 
determined  at  all  costs  to  uphold  the  Constitution  of 
Church  and  State  as  by  law  established. 

Further,  a  certain  section  were  dubbed  "  High 
Churchmen,"  with  a  different  signification  from  our 
own,  because  they  were  opposed  to  their  Low-Church 
brethren.  The  latter,  in  doctrine,  approximated  to 
the  Dissenters,  and  were,  therefore,  looked  upon  as 
possibly  dangerous  allies  because  they  were  on  the 
down-grade,  and  might  at  any  time  enter  into  alliance 
with  those  whose  forces  made  for  disintegration, 
with  its  natural  consequence,  an  upheaval  of  the 
Constitution.  State  and  Church  had  become,  in  the 
eyes  of  the  majority,  one  and  indivisible.  It  was, 
perhaps,  the  last  mighty  effort  to  realize  the  mediaeval 
dream  with  a  reversal  of  the  premier  role. 

In  the  "  Sentiments  of  a  Church  of  England  man," 
written  in  1704,  Swift  tried  to  prove  to  the  Whigs 
that  the  Church  of  England  was  wide  enough  for  the 
highest  principles  of  civil  liberty,  and  to  the  Tories 
that,  in  order  to  be  a  religious  and  God-fearing  man,  it 
was  not  absolutely  necessary  to  be  a  Tory  in  politics. 


IN   THE   BLAZE  OF  THE   FOOTLIGHTS   73 

"The  Church  of  England  Man  has  both  a  true 
veneration  for  the  scheme  established  among  us  ot 
Ecclesiastical  Government,  and  though  he  will  not 
determine  whether  Episcopacy  be  of  divine  right,  he 
is  sure  it  is  most  agreeable  to  primitive  institutions, 
fittest  of  all  others  for  preserving  order  and  purity, 
and  under  its  present  regulations,  best  calculated 
for  our  civil  state.  He  should,  therefore,  think  the 
abolishment  of  that  order  among  us  would  prove 
a  mighty  scandal  and  corruption  of  our  faith  and 
manifestly  dangerous  to  our  monarchy  ;  nay,  he 
would  defend  it  by  arms  against  all  powers  on  earth, 
except  our  own  legislature,  in  which  case  he  would 
submit  as  to  a  general  calamity,  a  death,  or  a 
pestilence." 

To  prevent  the  further  eruption  of  Dissent,  he 
thinks  it  only  just  that  the  State  should  give  "all 
rewards  of  trust,  profit,  and  dignity  to  those  whose 
principles  direct  them  to  preserve  the  Constitution  in 
all  its  parts."  He  shows  that  resistance  by  the  Church 
saved  the  State  from  Rome,  and  thus  confounds  the 
illogicalness  of  the  Dissenters. 

Peace  and  order  is  the  ideal  set  up  by  Swift. 

"  I  think  it  clear  that  any  great  separation  from 
the  established  worship,  though  to  a  new  one  that  is 
more  clear  and  perfect,  may  be  an  occasion  of  en- 
dangering the  public  peace,  because  it  will  compose 
a  body  always  in  reserve,  prepared  to  follow  any 
discontented  heads  upon  the  plausible  pretext  of 
advancing  true  religion  and  opposing  error  and 
superstition  or  idolatry." 


74  DEAN   SWIFT 

The  Church  of  England  man  is  ready  to  adopt 
any  form  of  government,  to  be  ruled  by  one  or  by 
many,  provided  that  the  one  or  the  many  is  the 
executive  carrying  out  the  laws  passed  by  the  whole 
— laws  which  cannot  be  abrogated  save  by  the  con- 
sent of  the  whole  nation.  For  Swift,  the  magistrate 
whom  it  is  unlawful  to  resist  is  the  legislative,  not 
the  executive.  The  conclusion  of  this  pamphlet 
illustrates  Swift's  attitude  to  political  parties,  and 
perhaps  affords  some  clue  to  the  reason  why  he 
failed  to  obtain  ecclesiastical  preferment. 

"I  should  think  that,  in  order  to  preserve  the 
Constitution  entire  in  Church  and  State,  whoever 
has  a  value  for  both  would  be  sure  to  avoid  the 
extremes  of  Whig  for  the  sake  of  the  former  and  the 
extremes  of  Tory  on  account  of  the  latter.  I  have  an 
ambition  to  wish  at  least  that  both  parties  may  think 
me  in  the  right,  which  would  be  of  some  use  to  those 
who  have  any  virtue  left.  But  if  that  is  not  to  be 
hoped  for,  my  next  wish  should  be  that  both  might 
think  me  in  the  wrong — that  would  be  a  sure  ground 
to  believe  that  I  have  proceeded  at  least  with 
impartiality  and  perhaps  with  truth." 

Sincerity  in  politics  was  then,  as  now,  an  impossi- 
bility, and  the  impartial  critic  of  either  side  was 
not  likely  to  succeed,  more  especially  if  the  vitriol 
of  Swift's  caustic  sarcasm  lent  a  black  tip  to  his 
pen  wherever  principle  was  concerned. 

To  sum  up  the  position  of  affairs,  we  have  in 
the  relation  of  Church  to  State  an  inverted  mediaeval 
doctrine,  the  State  and  the  Church  were  one  with 


IN   THE   BLAZE   OF  THE   FOOTLIGHTS   75 

the  State  primus,  and  the  Church,  to  use  Mr.  Sichel's 
words,  "paid  its  tribute  willingly  to  Caesar."  The 
majority  of  the  Tory  party,  however,  as  was  seen 
in  the  action  of  the  Non  Jurors,  paid  this  tribute 
to  the  State  as  a  whole,  and  not  to  the  personal 
sovereign— to  the  Crown,  not  to  the  King. 

This,  however,  is  only  one  side  of  the  question. 
It  may  be  a  truism  to  remark  that  religion  begets 
principles,  that  the  Church  lends  a  stability  to 
character,  and  in  a  wider  sense  to  party,  paradoxical 
though  it  may  sound.  Hence  the  Tories  main- 
tained as  a  grievance  the  adherence  of  the  Whigs 
to  a  set  of  men  rather  than  to  principles.  The 
Whigs  were  a  "solvent  in  the  State"  rather  than 
a  consolidating  force,  and  since  they  possessed  an 
overwhelming  majority  in  the  House  of  Lords,  they 
had  shifted  the  balance  of  power  from  the  Crown 
and  Commons  to  that  assembly.  The  result  of  the 
Marlborough  and  Godolphin  administration  had 
been  to  found  an  oligarchy. 

The  Tories,  on  the  other  hand,  insisted  that  the 
Crown  had  a  right  to  appeal  from  the  Cabinet  to 
the  people,  to  influence  ministerial  deliberation 
directly  by  its  presence ;  to  appoint  Bishops ;  to 
make  peace  or  war ;  to  issue  Royal  warrants ;  to 
dissolve  Parliament;  to  approve  or  disapprove  the 
choice  of  the  Speaker.  Again,  the  Tory  party  were 
urgent  on  Parliamentary  reform,  on  the  diminution 
of  undue  influence  in  election. 

It  seems  remarkable  that  with  convictions  of 
this  nature,   the    Tories    should    not    have    secured 


7^  DEAN   SWIFT 

earlier  a  larger  majority.  There  was,  however,  that 
influence  to  be  contended  with  which  in  England 
has  perhaps  been  the  moving  power  ever  since 
the  Hanoverian  succession  was  established.  The 
Whigs  had  on  their  side  the  monied  class,  a  fact 
which,  in  a  country  of  shopkeepers,  gave  them 
extraordinary  weight  and  influence.  As  Swift  says, 
"  they  were  a  bundle  of  faggots  tied  together  by 
banknotes,"  which  is  remarkably  strong  as  a 
temporary  binding.  At  the  same  time  it  leaves 
individuals  entirely  at  the  mercy  of  their  supporters, 
and  there  are  few  things  more  unstable  than  gold- 
washed  patronage.  It  is  therefore  a  little  singular 
to  find  Swift  at  first  on  this  side  until  we  consider 
that  his  reason,  which  influenced  his  actions  for  the 
most  part,  entirely  forbade  agreement  with  the  Tory 
theory  of  Divine  Right,  and  that  all  his  early  life  was 
influenced  by  the  prejudices  of  Sir  William  Temple. 

The  monied  class,  moreover,  had  embarked  on 
a  big  speculation  in  the  war  of  the  Spanish  Suc- 
cession, and  were  just  now  entirely  satisfied  with 
their  managing  director,  Marlborough.  He  was  anti- 
French  and  anti-Catholic,  and  intended  to  promote 
the  colonial  expansion  of  England.  The  Tories, 
moreover,  were  a  divided  camp^English  Tories, 
French  Tories,  Hanoverian  Tories,  and  Pretender 
Tories.  The  word  "  Pretender,"  moreover,  was 
anathema,  and  this  probably  threw  on  to  the  Whig 
side  many  people  who  were  Tory  in  sympathy,  while 
those  remained  with  the  Whigs  who  intended  to 
support  the  Hanoverian  Succession. 


IN  THE  BLAZE  OF  THE  FOOTLIGHTS  'jj 

The  Tories,  however,  were  equally  sound  on 
their  side;  they  prided  themselves  on  the  fact  that 
the  Church  had  brought  about  the  Revolution  by 
resisting  Papists  and  Dissenters,  or,  as  Boling- 
broke  put  it,  had  determined  to  keep  a  Presby- 
terian from  being  Mayor  and  a  Papist  from  being 
King.  In  spite,  however,  of  the  good  services  which 
the  Church  had  rendered  to  the  Revolution,  it  had 
been  neglected  by  the  Whig  party,  and  the  bulk 
of  the  clergy  were  in  the  Tory  camp.  Whig  prin- 
ciples and  the  majority  of  the  Whig  party  were 
diametrically  opposed  to  the  Church,  largely  because 
the  Dissenters  and  free-thinkers  were  to  be  found 
on  that  side,  or  as  Swift  said,  "would  pull  down 
the  present  establishment  of  monarchy  or  religion 
as  soon  as  any  set  of  Papists  in  Christendom." 
It  was  because  Swift  felt  this  so  keenly  that  in 
the  period  of  his  life  at  which  we  have  arrived, 
we  find  him  ready  to  enlist  himself  on  the  Tory 
side,  and  when  the  Government,  on  the  appointing 
of  Lord  Wharton  to  the  Lord-Lieutenancy  of 
Ireland  in  1709,  sought  to  repeal  the  Test  Act,  in 
order,  as  Swift  thought,  to  pander  to  the  Dissenters 
and  upset  the  settlement  of  Church  and  State  in 
Ireland,  the  die  was  cast.  He  retired  in  disgust  to 
Laracor,  and  from  this  point,  that  feeling  of  distrust 
of  the  Whigs  which  had  been  seething  in  his  mind 
for  some  time  became  entirely  subject  to  his  con- 
victions, which  were  on  the  Tory  side.  Let  none 
therefore  hurl  the  reproach  of  levity  against  Swift. 
No  man  remained  more  true  to  the  principles  with 


78  DEAN   SWIFT 

which    he    set    out,    and   few  have   risked   more   in 
support  of  conviction  than  he  did. 

He  retired  to  Laracor,  however,  by  no  means 
in  the  character  in  which  he  had  set  out.  The 
insignificant  parson  no  longer  existed.  There  had 
appeared  before  the  public  world  a  man  who  com- 
bined in  himself  the  qualities  of  brilliant  satirist 
and  political  writer  unequalled  for  telling  phrases 
and  vitriolic  wit,  and  withal  a  strong  Churchman 
and  defender  of  the  establishment  known  as  Church 
and  State. 

For  some  time  he  had  been  a  marked  man  in 
Ireland,  not  the  least  for  his  extraordinary  faith- 
fulness to  his  clerical  duties.  He  carried  out  in 
the  details  of  practice,  the  theories  expressed  in  his 
writings,  and  it  was  no  doubt  for  these  reasons, 
in  spite  of  his  character  for  lack  of  orthodox 
Churchmanship  which  he  had  achieved  by  the  publi- 
cation of  the  "Tale  of  a  Tub,"  that  he  was  chosen  in 
1707  to  go  to  England  on  the  business  of  the  Irish 
First-Fruits.  He  was  recognized  as  a  man  who  could 
move  men,  and  from  this  time  begins  the  period 
of  active  influence  when  Swift  was  universally 
recognized  as  the  most  influential  agent  in  the 
country. 

"  In  the  year  1707,  moreover.  Swift  first  laid  public 
claim  to  the  character  of  a  humorist  and  a  man  of 
wit,  by  commencing  an  attack  upon  Partridge,  the 
noted  astrologer.  His  first  tract  on  this  subject  was 
entitled,  "  Prediction  for  the  Year  1708  :  wherein  the 
month,  and   day  of  the   month,   are    set   down,  the 


IN   THE   BLAZE   OF  THE   FOOTLIGHTS    79 

persons  named,  and  the  great  actions  and  events  of 
next  year  particularly  related  as  they  will  come  to 
pass,  and  written  to  prevent  the  people  of  England 
from  being  farther  imposed  upon  by  vulgar  almanac- 
makers  :  by  Isaac  Bickerstaffe,  Esq."  In  this  the 
first  prediction  is  the  death  of  Partridge  himself.  He 
says,  "  I  have  consulted  the  stars  of  his  nativity  by 
my  own  rules,  and  find  he  will  infallibly  die  upon  the 
29th  of  March  next,  about  11  at  night,  of  a  raging 
fever,  and  therefore  I  advise  him  to  consider  of  it, 
and  settle  his  affairs  in  time." 

In  the  year  1708  Swift  published  a  second  tract 
entitled  :  "  The  accomplishment  of  the  first  of  Mr. 
Bickerstaffe's  Predictions,  being  an  Account  of  the 
death  of  Mr.  Partridge,  the  almanac-maker,  upon  the 
29th  instant :  in  a  letter  to  a  person  of  honour."  He 
there  describes  with  inimitable  humour  Partridge's 
last  illness,  Bickerstaffe's  visit  to  him,  when  he  con- 
fessed that  the  latter's  "  Predictions "  had  worked  so 
strongly  upon  his  mind  as  to  produce  his  present 
disorder ;  declares  his  ignorance  and  deceits,  and  dies 
repentant. 

Partridge  at  length  replied  in  a  pamphlet,  which 
has  been  falsely  attributed  to  Mr.  Rowe,  entitled, 
"Squire  Bickerstaffe  Detected,  or  the  Astrological 
Impostor  convicted :  by  John  Partridge,  student  in 
physic  and  astrology."  This  was  followed  by  "A 
true  and  impartiall  account  of  the  proceedings  of 
Isaac  Bickerstaffe,  Esq.,  against  me  J. P."  In  the 
last  of  these  Partridge  exposes  the  ludicrous  con- 
sequences attending  the  report  of  his  death,  the  visits 


8o  DEAN   SWIFT 

of  undertakers,  grave-diggers,  etc.,  and  concludes  with 
a  furious  denunciation  against  the  Squire  and  France 
and  Rome,  all  of  whom  he  declared  to  be  in  conspiracy 
against  him. 

In  1709,  Swift  wrote  "A  Vindication  of  Isaac 
Bickerstaffe,  Esq.,  against  what  is  objected  to  him  by 
Mr.  Partridge  in  his  almanac  for  the  present  year 
1709;  by  the  said  Isaac  Bickerstaffe,  Esq."  Alter 
humorously  stating  the  attention  with  which  the 
controversy  had  been  treated  by  all  the  learned 
men  of  Europe,  he  proceeds  gravely  to  prove  that 
Partridge  actually  died  within  half  an  hour  of  the 
time  he  foretold,  which  he  makes  appear  from  the 
inconsistency  of  Partridge's  own  answers." 

Swift  published  shortly  afterwards  an  elegy  on 
Partridge  concluding  with  the  following  epitaph  : — 

"  Here,  five  feet  deep,  lies  on  his  back, 
A  cobbler,  star-monger,  and  quack  ; 
Who  to  the  stars  in  pure  good  will 
Does  to  his  best  look  upward  still. 
Weep,  all  you  customers  that  use 
Yi\s  pills,  his  almanacs,  or  shoes  : 
And  you  that  did  your  fortunes  seek. 
Step  to  his  grave,  but  once  a  week : 
This  earth,  which  bears  his  body's  print 
You'll  find  has  so  much  virtue  in't. 
That  I  durst  pawn  my  ears  'tv/'ll  tell 
Whate'er  concerns  you  full  as  well, 
\xv  physic,  stolen  goods,  or  love. 
As  he  himself  could  when  above." 


JiKA.N     >\\  It    I 
KROM    AX    E.NGKAVINc;    IN    THE    NATIONAL    (iALI-Ein',    DUBLIN 


CHAPTER  IV 
THE  CRISIS  AND  THE  CATASTROPHE 

IT  was  on  a  Church  question  that  Swift  came  into 
notice  among  the  Whigs,  and  on  a  Church 
question  he  quarrelled  with  them,  though  his 
sympathies  were  not  on  the  side  of  Ireland.  The 
remission  of  the  First- Fruits  was  dear  to  him  because 
it  meant  an  act  of  justice  to  the  Irish  Church,  the 
amendment  of  a  personal  grievance,  for  the  narrow- 
ness of  Irish  livings  affected  him  personally,  and  it 
afforded  him  his  first  real  opportunity  of  acting  as 
spokesman  on  behalf  of  an  important  cause,  the 
principle  of  which  appealed  to  him  very  strongly. 
He  was  perhaps  the  more  anxious  to  prove  his 
capacity  at  this  time,  for  he  had  already  begun  to 
feel  the  pernicious  effects  of  his  rashness  in  pub- 
lishing the  "Tale  of  a  Tub,"  with  a  bigoted  and 
unreasoning  Churchwoman  on  the  throne ;  and  had 
failed  to  obtain  the  bishopric  of  Waterford  which  he 
knew  ought  to  be  his.  The  danger  to  the  cause  of 
the  Church,  moreover,  was  growing  apace,  for  the 
Whig  ministry  was  stronger  than  ever,  and  the  risk 
which  Swift  ran  with  regard  to  his  own  prospects  in 
promoting  a  Church  question,  no  doubt  added  to  the 
pleasure  of  doing  so. 

G  81 


82  DEAN   SWIFT 

The  First-Fruits  paid  by  the  Irish  Church  to  the 
Crown  amounted  to  some  ^^3000  a  year,  together 
with  the  extra  burden  of  collecting,  which  was  both 
onerous  and  expensive.  Irish  Convocation  had 
urgently  pressed  for  their  remission  after  the  founda- 
tion of  Queen  Anne's  Bounty  in  1704,  when  the 
English  First-Fruits  were  resigned  by  the  Crown. 
It  was  not  to  be  expected,  however,  that  this  would 
be  conceded  without  a  struggle.  It  was  possibly  a 
surprise  to  the  Whig  Government  to  find  Swift  so 
ardent  an  upholder  of  his  mission.  They  were  wise 
enough  to  recognize  his  sincerity,  while,  at  the  same 
time,  they  determined  to  keep  his  support  by  not 
rejecting  his  request  entirely.  The  dismissal  of 
Harley  from  office  and  the  consequent  resignation 
of  the  remaining  Tories  rendered  Swift  not  less 
hopeful,  and  though,  in  1708,  he  was  allowed  a  per- 
sonal interview  with  Godolphin,  he  could  obtain 
nothing  further  than  the  promise  of  the  remission 
of  the  First-Fruits  in  return  for  a  repeal  by  the  Irish 
Bishops  of  the  Sacramental  Test  against  Irish  Dis- 
senters. This  naturally  could  not  be  conceded,  as 
the  Test  Act  was  looked  on  by  Swift,  as  by  all 
Churchmen,  as  one  of  the  main  supports  of  the 
Church.  No  doubt  the  repeal  of  the  Test  was 
strongly  advocated  by  the  new  Lord-Lieutenant  of 
Ireland,  who  was  wholly  antipathetic  to  Swift  and 
his  principles. 

So  far  Swift  had  been  unsuccessful.  His  hope  of 
pushing  this  cause,  through  the  favour  of  the  party 
hitherto  supported  by  him  and  now  held  in  supreme 


THE   CRISIS   AND   THE  CATASTROPHE    83 

favour,  was  considerably  lessened,  and  though  he 
hoped  for  preferment,  he  must  have  felt  that  by 
advocating  an  adverse  cause,  he  was  risking  his  own 
chances  of  promotion.  In  accordance  with  this  feel- 
ing he  wrote  to  Dr.  King,  Archbishop  of  Dublin  : 
"  No  prospect  of  making  my  fortune  shall  ever  prevail 
on  me  to  go  against  what  becomes  a  man  of  conscience 
and  truth,  and  an  entire  friend  to  the  established 
Church."  These  words,  so  prophetic  in  their  utter- 
ance, seem  already  to  ring  the  death-knell  of  his 
hopes  and  ambition.  If  he  could,  for  one  moment, 
have  sacrificed  his  principles  to  self-interest,  his  own 
cause  would  have  been  won,  but  this  was  impossible 
to  him. 

For  the  present  he  could  do  nothing  further  for 
the  Irish  Church,  and  he  therefore  turned  his  attention 
to  writing.  He  found  scope  for  his  genius  in  the 
Tatter,  which  had  been  lately  started  by  Steele,  and 
he  also  published  various  pamphlets.  The  "Senti- 
ments of  a  Church  of  England  Man  "  has  already  been 
discussed  as  throwing  light  on  Swift's  Churchman- 
ship,  the  others  were  the  "Argument  to  prove  the 
inconvenience  of  abolishing  Christianity"  and  a  "Pro- 
ject for  the  Advancement  of  Religion."  All  were 
written  in  support  of  Christianity,  laying  down  the 
tenet  that,  from  the  point  of  view  of  common-sense 
alone,  religion,  as  embodying  an  element  of  stability, 
was  for  the  advantage  of  the  nation.  Swift,  with 
other  reformers,  adopted  the  attitude  that  the  present 
age  was  without  precedent  in  wickedness,  and  the 
need  of  reform  greater  than  ever  before.    The  obvious 


84  DEAN    SWIFT 

honesty  of  the  writer  had  the  result  that  some  idea 
was  mooted  of  building  more  churches.  He  took  a 
further  step  in  bolstering  up  the  Church  by  his 
pamphlet  written  in  the  form  of  a  "  Letter  to  a 
Member  of  the  English  House  of  Commons,"  strongly 
urging  the  necessity  of  upholding  the  Test  in  Ireland. 

Closely  following  on  these  three  pamphlets  came 
another  abortive  attempt  to  obtain  the  remission  of 
the  First-Fruits.  It  was  declared  that  Swift's  mission 
had  been  successful,  but,  to  his  chagrin,  he  had  per- 
force to  confess  himself  once  more  beaten,  and  once 
more  to  await  his  opportunity.  A  Whig  attempt  to 
mollify  him  was  made  by  holding  out  to  him  the 
hope  of  a  prebend  of  Westminster,  though  nothing 
came  of  it,  and  Swift,  at  the  age  of  forty-two,  found 
himself  still  as  far  from  promotion  as  ever.  Dis- 
satisfaction must  by  this  time  have  been  rankling  in 
his  mind,  for,  not  only  were  his  own  merits  meeting 
with  no  recognition  from  those  whom  he  supported, 
but  besides,  all  his  principles  were  being  ridden  over 
rough-shod.  At  this  time  personal  ambition  and 
principles  went  hand  in  hand,  though  it  was  on  the 
ground  of  principles  that  Swift  left  the  party  which 
in  17 10  failed  to  obtain  the  support  of  the  country. 
Swift  left  the  Whigs  before  their  downfall,  and  joined 
the  Tories  because  they  were  ready  to  support  the 
interests  of  the  Church. 

The  fall  of  the  Whig  Ministry,  however,  closely 
followed  another  incident,  the  impeachment  of  Sache- 
verell,  which  was  coincident  with  the  fact  that  a 
changeable  nation  was  growing  weary  of  the  war  on 


THE  CRISIS  AND  THE  CATASTROPHE   85 

which  they  had  entered  with  so  great  enthusiasm. 
Perhaps  some  slight  summary  of  foreign  politics  at 
this  point  will  render  clearer  the  position  of  affairs 
for  England. 

The  war  of  the  Spanish  Succession  meant  for 
England  colonial  expansion  and  an  increase  of  com- 
mercial prosperity  which  coincided  with  her  people's 
unrestrained  passion  for  wealth  and  luxury.  As 
Spain  declined,  owing  partly  to  the  struggle  with 
England,  and  still  more  so  to  the  failure  of  her 
people  to  rise  to  the  situation,  the  struggle  for  the 
Trans-oceanic  possessions,  as  far  as  England  was 
concerned,  was  with  the  French.  To  prevent  France 
from  stepping  into  the  Spanish  treasure  hordes  was 
the  object  of  the  statesmanship  of  the  eighteenth 
century.  The  possession  of,  or  at  any  rate  influence 
over,  the  Spanish  Kingdom,  because  of  its  harbours, 
its  sea-front,  its  sailor  class,  was  the  aim  of  the 
French  monarchy.  It  was  equally  the  object  of 
England  to  prevent  this  at  all  hazards,  and  in  that 
contest  Holland  was  joined  partly  because  she  too 
was  a  maritime  power,  but  more  so  because  France 
as  the  successor  of  Spain  might  become  mistress  of 
the  Spanish  Low  Countries.  The  war  which  has 
received  the  historical  title  "the  war  of  the  Spanish 
Succession"  was  in* essence  a  Trade  War,  the  first 
beginnings  of  that  struggle  with  France  for  oceanic 
supremacy  which  resulted  in  the  capture  of  Quebec 
and  the  battle  of  Trafalgar. 

At  first  all  went  well,  and  England  was  called 
upon  to  rejoice  over  one  great  victory  after  another. 


86  DEAN   SWIFT 

but  as  the  monetary  burden  of  the  war  became  more 
and  more  heavy  upon  the  English  people,  the  whole 
nation,  led  by  the  country  squire  whose  sympathies 
were  on  the  Tory  side,  began  to  groan  under  the 
ever-increasing  weight. 

The  hostility  to  the  Whig  ministry  grew  and 
came  to  a  financial  climax  in  the  imposition  of  a  new 
levied  tax  of  6s.  in  the  pound.  Prices  rose;  there 
was  a  scarcity  of  corn,  and  when  Parliament  met  in 
1709  the  country  was  seething  with  discontent.  Fuel 
was  added  to  the  fire  when  Parliament  proceeded  to 
the  impeachment  of  Dr.  Sacheverell  in  the  winter  of 
the  same  year.  This  action  was  meant  to  fall  as  a 
heavy  blow  on  the  Tory  leaders.  The  result,  however, 
for  Government  was  that  it  furnished  the  opposition 
with  a  cause,  and  the  cause  with  a  martyr,  and  at 
this  point  began  the  downfall  of  the  Whig  ministry. 
Their  action  had  touched  the  Queen  on  a  tender  spot, 
her  highest  susceptibilities  had  been  wounded  in 
an  attack  on  one  of  the  ministers  of  the  Church. 
Moreover,  she  had  for  some  time  now  resented  the 
arrogant  and  overbearing  behaviour  of  the  Whigs, 
and  was  quite  ready  to  look  to  other  men  to  uphold 
her  authority  and  maintain  the  interests  of  the 
country. 

Sacheverell  was  the  rector  of  St.  Saviour's,  South- 
wark,  noted  for  his  violent  and  truculent  speaking. 
The  immediate  offence  was  a  sermon  preached  in 
November,  1709,  on  the  "  Perils  of  False  Brethren 
both  in  Church  and  State,"  in  which,  without  im- 
pugning  the   Revolution,  he   preached  the   doctrine 


THE  CRISIS  AND  THE  CATASTROPHE  S7 

of  non-resistance,  which  led  to  the  attack  on  him  by 
Government,  who  wished  to  implicate  the  Church 
party  with  the  High  Tory  party. 

The  plan  of  Government,  however,  did  not  succeed 
in  the  way  they  had  intended.  Sacheverell's  sentence 
of  three  years'  suspension  set  a  howling  mob  at  the 
heels  of  the  ministry.  He  became  the  popular 
favourite,  led  a  triumphant  procession  through  the 
country,  being  saluted  by  peals  of  bells  and  decorated 
streets  at  Banbury,  Oxford,  Warwick,  Shrewsbury, 
and  Ludlow,  as  he  proceeded  to  his  country  living  in 
Shropshire.  This  acclamation  was  merely  a  sign  of 
the  times.  The  popular  voice,  as  always  happens, 
was  the  outward  expression  of  the  trend  of  circum- 
stances. The  country  was  at  last  awakened  to  the 
knowledge  that  they  were  being  governed  by  an 
oligarchy  under  the  guise  of  a  limited  monarchy,  and 
that  the  attack  had  been  made  on  Sacheverell  by  a 
small  faction  who  intended  to  have  the  power  in 
their  hands,  if  need  be  at  the  cost  of  the  country's 
prosperity  and  to  the  utter  disregard  of  the  wishes 
of  the  people.  The  dignity  of  the  Crown,  the  safety 
of  the  Church  and  State  were  tottering ;  the  Queen's 
pride,  moreover,  was  hurt  by  the  presumptuous 
behaviour  of  the  Marlboroughs,  and  Marlborough's 
inopportune  demand  at  this  juncture  to  be  made 
Captain-General  for  life  decided  her  on  her  course 
of  action.  The  Whig  ministry  fell,  and  the  Tories 
came  into  power.  Harley  became  Chancellor  of  the 
Exchequer;  Sir  Simon  Harcourt,  Attorney-General; 
Rochester,    Lord    President ;   Ormonde,  Viceroy   of 


88  DEAN    SWIFT 

Ireland;  and  Henry  St.  John,  Secretary  of  State, 
while  at  the  next  election  in  November,  1710,  the 
Tories  were  returned  with  an  enormous  majority. 

Swift  must  have  received  all  these  changes  with 
mixed  feelings.  On  his  arrival  in  England,  in 
September,  to  make  one  more  attempt  to  obtain  the 
remission  of  the  First-Fruits,  he  was  received  by  the 
Whigs  with  open  arms.  They  were  ready  now  to 
treat  with  him  on  any  terms,  to  promise  him  any- 
thing. "  The  Whigs  were  ravished  to  see  me,  and 
would  lay  hold  on  me  as  a  twig  while  they  are 
drowning,  and  the  great  men  making  me  their 
clumsy  apologies."  Godolphin,  however,  received 
him  coldly,  for  which,  perhaps  in  jest,  he  vowed 
vengeance  to  Stella.  Their  attempts  at  explanation 
were  received  coldly  by  Swift,  who  was  too  sincere  to 
show  a  warmth  which  he  did  not  feel.  He  was  rightly 
hurt  by  their  former  treatment  of  him.  "  Rot  them 
for  ungrateful  dogs  ;  I  will  make  them  repent  of  their 
usage."  But  this  resentment  was  only  the  expression 
of  personal  anger;  it  was  not  the  cause  of  his  change 
of  party.  If  this  had  been  the  case  he  could  have 
joined  the  Whigs  again  later,  for  they  would  always 
have  been  ready  to  receive  on  their  side  the  active 
support  of  so  invincible  a  pen.  While  he  steadily 
refused  all  attempt  at  reconciliation  with  the  leaders, 
he  maintained  his  former  friendship  with  Addison  and 
his  circle.  He  also  contributed  papers  to  the  Tatler. 
He  was  advised  to  leave  his  mission  in  the  back- 
ground until  "  this  hurry  was  a  little  over."  He 
found  himself  in  the  middle  of  a  great  ferment,  and 


THE  CRISIS  AND  THE  CATASTROPHE   89 

"  was  heartily  weary  of  this  town."  He  longed  for 
his  willows  at  Laracor.  September  21st  saw  the  fall 
of  the  ministry,  and  on  October  4th  he  was  introduced 
to  Harley,  the  new  Chancellor  of  the  Exchequer. 
From  this  time  he  gave  up  all  hope  of  his  willows 
at  Laracor,  he  was  drawn  into  a  seething  whirlpool, 
from  which  there  was  no  escape  until  he  was  thrown 
out  as  his  turn  came  round.  For  four  years  he 
remained  in  the  living,  seething  metropolis,  himself 
the  central  figure  of  political  activity.  It  is  no 
exaggeration  to  say  that  he  was  the  centre  of  this 
busy  world.  He  came  gradually  to  be  looked  upon 
as  the  intermediary  betv/een  a  lesser  and  a  greater 
world,  the  pivot  on  which  everything  turned.  We 
cannot  forbear  wondering  at  this  point.  Did  this 
constitute  happiness  for  Swift?  The  answer  must 
be  Yes,  as  far  as  happiness  was  in  any  way  possible 
for  an  idealist,  who  always  saw  one  height  further 
than  that  on  which  he  stood,  or  for  an  ambitious 
man  of  whom  it  is  no  reproach  to  say  that  he  sought 
for  some  suitable  recompense  for  his  services.  Do 
not  we  all  seek  for  a  return  ?  The  world  is  not  built 
on  a  disinterested  basis ;  the  payment  differs  in  kind, 
but  we  all  wish  for  it.  Therefore,  if  Swift  was  but 
human  in  this  respect,  must  a  reproach  be  cast  in  his 
teeth,  because  he  stood  on  a  pinnacle  and  demanded 
a  reward  to  crown  the  citadel?  Why  should  "am- 
bition "  be  hurled  at  him  as  the  crowning  reproach  ? 
He  was  built  on  a  massive  plan,  so,  too,  were  his 
desires  and  emotions.  He  lived  in  a  great  world, 
while  we,  for  the   most   part,  live  in   a   small   one; 


90  DEAN    SWIFT 

but  let  us  not,  therefore,  play  the  frog  to  his 
bull. 

The  introduction  to  Harley  led  to  relations  with 
St.  John,  and  by  a  careful  use  of  the  opportunity 
lent  by  the  First-Fruits,  Swift  was  won  over  to  the 
Tory  side.  His  mission  met  with  immediate  suc- 
cess, and  Swift  saw,  to  his  extreme  satisfaction, 
that  he  was  at  last  to  achieve  that  for  which  he  had 
waited  so  long.  Seventeen  days  after  his  introduc- 
tion to  the  Tories,  the  remission  of  the  First-Fruits 
was  granted  to  Ireland,  and  Swift  was  bound  to  the 
Tories  heart  and  soul.  He  was  welcomed  with  the 
utmost  warmth  by  the  ministry ;  as  they  afterwards 
confessed  to  him,  he  was  the  only  man  they  feared. 
They  knew  they  had  in  him  an  invulnerable  and 
efficient  ally.  None  of  their  writers  were  to  be 
trusted  as  they  knew  Swift  could  be ;  none  held  a 
pen  which,  like  the  music  of  Orpheus,  could  make 
the  very  stones  turn.  They  wished  for  a  pamphleteer 
who  was  absolutely  proof  against  corruption,  and 
they  knew  that  in  Swift  they  had  found  one.  All  the 
Whig  efforts  to  reclaim  him  were  from  this  time 
useless.  He  was  at  once  admitted  on  terms  of 
intimacy  with  the  Tory  leaders.  "  He  (Harley),"  he 
writes  to  Stella,  "  charged  me  to  come  to  him  often. 
I  told  him  I  was  loth  to  trouble  him  in  so  much 
business  as  he  had,  and  desired  I  might  have  leave  to 
come  to  his  levee  ;  which  he  immediately  refused,  and 
said  that  was  not  a  place  for  friends  to  come  to." 

He  is  delighted  to  find  himself  so  much  thought 
of     He  stands   already  "with   the   new  people   ten 


THE   CRISIS   AND   THE   CATASTROPHE   91 

times  better  than  ever  he  did  with  the  old;  forty 
times  more  caressed."  Yet,  at  the  same  time,  there 
is  a  slight  feeling  of  distrust.  "  All  this  is  odd  and 
very  comical ;  he  (Harley)  knew  my  name  very  well." 
A  few  months  later  the  feeling  has  become  certainty. 
"  They  call  me  nothing  but  Jonathan,  and  I  said  I 
believed  they  would  leave  me  Jonathan,  as  they 
found  me." 

A  quarrel  with  Harley  over  an  offer  of  £s'^  in 
return  for  his  services  established  Swift  still  more 
firmly  with  the  Government,  for  they  now  saw  more 
clearly  the  character  of  the  man  whom  they  had, 
somewhat  lightly  perhaps,  induced  to  join  their 
ranks,  and  admiration  for  his  genius  was  now 
coupled  with  a  compulsory  respect.  He  had,  more- 
over, written  in  October  some  verses  entitled  "  Sid 
Hamet's  Rod,"  in  which  he  attacked  Godolphin,  the 
late  Lord  Treasurer,  and  shortly  afterwards  attacked 
Lord  Wharton  in  a  violent,  though  perhaps  not 
slanderous,  pamphlet.  On  both  these  grounds  he 
was  in  high  favour  with  Harley  and  St.  John. 

It  is  impossible  to  imagine  two  men  more  entirely 
opposed  in  character  and  attainments  than  Harley 
and  St.  John.  For  the  one  Swift  came  to  feel  the 
affection  and  respect  for  a  friend  whom  he  could  meet 
on  terms  of  equality,  to  the  other  he  must  always 
look  up  as  to  a  superior,  and  though  he  admired 
St.  John's  brilliance,  the  fact  of  his  superior  genius 
was  sufficient  to  deter  Swift  from  the  close  friendship 
with  him  which  he  maintained  with  Harley. 

There  was,  perhaps,  between  Harley  and  St.  John 


92  DEAN   SWIFT 

the  same  difference  as  between  Addison  and  Steele, 
though  in  a  different  degree.  Harley  was  a  steady- 
going  politician,  without  any  of  the  qualities  which 
make  the  statesman.  Mediocre  is  the  adjective  which, 
perhaps,  most  aptly  describes  him.  He  came  from 
the  middle  classes,  and  was  eminently  suited  to  be 
their  idol. 

He  was  an  illustrator  of  the  truth  that  mediocrity 
and  conventionality  are  the  necessary  conditions  of 
practical  success.  Greatness,  in  any  sense  of  the 
word,  was  beyond  his  reach.  The  monumental 
qualities  of  Bolingbroke  belonged  to  another  world 
than  that  in  which  Harley  moved.  Brilliant  strokes 
of  policy  which  made  up  Bolingbroke's  life  were 
beyond  the  comprehension  of  Harley.  Philosophy, 
as  applied  to  politics,  seemed  to  him  worthless. 
Though  steady  routine,  unshaken  by  chance,  was  his 
true  environment,  yet  from  the  position  in  which 
fortune  placed  him  he  was  compelled  to  hang  on  to 
the  skirts  of  chance,  and  through  not  understanding 
her  he  lost  her  for  ever.  His  claim  to  success  lay 
also  in  the  fact  that  he  miade  few  enemies.  Brilliance 
and  not  mediocrity  is  the  target  for  the  malevolent, 
and  thus  it  was  fairly  plain-sailing  for  Harley.  He 
had  also  the  gift  of  inspiring  the  deepest  affection  in 
men,  and  so  had  round  him  a  circle  of  devoted  friends 
— Swift,  Arbuthnot,  and  others.  He  aspired  to  be 
considered  the  Maecenas  of  his  time,  and,  himself 
no  mean  student,  became  the  patron  of  writers  and 
strong  supporter  of  the  wits  of  the  day.  In  every 
case  gratitude  for  benefits  received  from  him  deepened 


THE   CRISIS   AND  THE  CATASTROPHE   93 

into  strong  affection.     In  some  cases,  no  doubt,  he 
used  for  his  own  purposes  and  for  reasons  of  policy 
the  men  who  thus  became  his  friends.     His  friendship 
for  Swift   undoubtedly  began   in   this  way,  and  the 
politician  made  the  best  use  possible  of  the  talents  of 
the  writer.     Swift  was  at  first  no  doubt  attracted  to 
him  merely  because  of  the  consideration  with  which 
he  was  treated,  which  came  as  a  reaction  after  the 
coldness  of  the  Whigs.     The  Tory  leader  was,  more- 
over, fairly  easy  to  understand ;  he  was  not  influenced 
by  the  caprice  which  renders  a  man  of  genius  un- 
certain, and  Swift  quickly  understood  the  whole  of 
his   nature.     Harley,    fortunately  for    himself,   pos- 
sessed  none   of  those   qualities   which,   while    they 
attract,  have  as  their  accompanying  defect  a  repelling 
force  which   prevents  lasting  friendship  with  their 
possessors.     The  insidious   qualities  of  indifference 
and  selfishness  are  not  at  first  so  apparent  to  the 
would-be  friend.     By  the  time  Swift  came  to  realize 
their  existence  in  his  patron,  he  had  become  greatly 
attached  to  him,  and  he  was  not  the  sort  of  friend  to 
be  easily  turned  aside.     The  attempted  assassination 
of  Harley  reduced  him  to  the  lowest  depth  of  despair, 
and  no  doubt  contributed  greatly  to  the  warmth  of 
his  affection.     It   formed   a  prominent  milestone  in 
their  friendship  which  was   destined  to  deepen  and 
strengthen  in  the  years  that  followed  until  it  reached 
its  climax  in  Swift's  rejection  of  offers  of  promotion 
in  order  to  accompany  his  despised  and  discomfited 
patron  into  retirement.    It  is  difficult  to  believe,  how- 
ever, that  the  friendship  was  as  warmly  reciprocated. 


94  DEAN   SWIFT 

The  calm  indifference  exhibited  by  Harley  at  the  time 
of  Guiscard's  attempt  characterized  his  relations  and 
actions  in  every  sphere  of  life.  He  was  incapable  of 
enthusiasm  even  where  his  own  interests  were  con- 
cerned, and  the  fluctuation  of  a  vacillating  nature 
rendered  decisive  action  almost  an  impossibility  to 
him.  In  his  lack  of  boldness  he  bears  an  extra- 
ordinary resemblance  to  Sir  William  Temple.  The 
conscientiousness  which  characterized  him  in  some 
respects,  was  not  extended  to  friendship,  and  lack 
of  tact  led  him  into  error,  as,  for  instance,  on  the 
occasion-  when  he  sent  Swift  ^^50  as  a  reward  for  his 
services  to  the  Tory  party.  Needless  to  say,  it  was 
refused,  and  some  months  passed  before  the  states- 
man was  reinstated  in  favour.  His  coldness  to  his 
friends  was  repeated  in  his  treatment  of  his  party, 
and  his  own  interests  were  allowed  to  override  those 
of  the  faction  which  he  upheld.  His  lack  of  dignity, 
moreover,  allowed  him  to  rally  round  him  the  trim- 
ming Tories,  while  he  left  to  St.  John  the  straighter 
course.  It  has  been  suggested  that  finance  was 
really  his  forte,  and  that  politics  should  have  been 
secondary  to  it.  No  doubt  he  won  favour  by  back- 
stairs methods  through  his  relationship  to  Abigail 
Hill.  He  was  destined  to  be  eclipsed  in  his  own 
time  by  the  superior  brilliance  and  straightforward- 
ness of  Bolingbroke,  and  his  star  in  history  has  been 
completely  extinguished  by  the  magnitude  of  the 
latter's  genius.  It  was  perhaps  scarcely  a  matter 
for  wonder  that  the  political  friendship  between 
these  two  did  not  last,  for  it  was  founded  merely  on 


THE   CRISIS   AND   THE   CATASTROPHE   95 

convenience  and  not  on  mutual  respect ;  yet  we  cannot 
help  regretting  that  a  state  partnership  so  famous 
as  this  should  have  ended  in  open  hostility  and 
bitter  recrimination.  Bolingbroke  wrote  of  Harley 
to  Swift:  "You  and  I  have  known  one  man  in  par- 
ticular who  affected  business  he  often  hindered  and 
never  did  ;  who  had  the  honour  among  some,  and  the 
blame  among  others,  of  bringing  about  great  revolu- 
tions in  his  own  country,  and  who  was  at  the  same 
time  the  idlest  creature  living  ;  who  was  never  more 
copious  than  in  expressing,  when  that  was  the  theme 
of  the  day,  his  indifference  to  power  and  his  contempt 
of  what  we  call  honours  .  .  .  who  should,  to  have 
been  consistent,  have  had  this  indifference  and  have 
felt  this  contempt,  since  he  knew  neither  how  to  use 
power  nor  how  to  wear  honour,  and  yet  who  was 
jealous  of  one  and  fond  of  the  other  even  to  ridicule." 
"  A  general  of  miners "  is  the  scornful  soubriquet 
applied  to  him  by  Bolingbroke.  No  doubt  he  fully 
expected  to  be  deserted  by  Harley  in  the  end,  and 
his  expectations  were  fulfilled.  The  two  men  were  so 
entirely  opposite  in  character,  and  though  they  were 
masters  of  the  same  political  party,  they  belonged  to 
different  factions  of  that  party,  for  Bolingbroke  led 
the  new  Tories  and  Harley  upheld  the  old,  so  that 
essentially  their  tenets  were  different,  and  their 
alliance  could  not  be  of  long  duration.  Harley, 
moreover,  though  a  Tory,  remained  true  to  Presby- 
terian ideals  throughout  his  life,  and  the  conscience 
developed  thereby  must  have  caused  him  much 
trepidation  when  he  observed  Bolingbroke's  course 


96  DEAN   SWIFT 

of  action.  The  commonplace  temperament  finds  it 
difficult  to  appreciate  the  mind  which  is  obviously 
above  those  of  its  fellows,  and,  as  a  rule,  imputes  to  it 
lower  motives  than  those  which  actually  guide  its 
own  action. 

The  anecdote  of  the  puritanical  Lady  Harley  is 
illustrative  of  the  spirit  of  her  husband  and  his 
household.  When  asked  by  the  Duchess  of  Sunder- 
land if  she  were  acquainted  with  a  certain  lord,  the 
old  lady  piously  answered,  "  I  know  no  lord,  but 
the  Lord  Jehovah."  It  was  no  doubt  typical  of 
Harley's  attitude  and  life,  when  he  wished  to  appear 
at  his  best. 

Swift  describes  him.  "  Mr.  Harley  had  the 
honour  of  being  chosen  Speaker  successively  to 
three  Parliaments  :  he  was  the  first  of  late  years, 
that  ventured  to  restore  the  forgotten  custom  of 
treating  his  Prince  with  duty  and  respect.  Easy 
and  distinguished  in  private  conversation,  with 
such  a  weight  of  affairs  upon  his  shoulders ;  of 
great  learning,  and  as  great  a  favourer  and  pro- 
tector of  it :  intrepid  by  nature,  or  will,  or  by  the 
consciousness  of  his  own  integrity,  and  a  despiser 
of  money :  pursuing  the  true  interest  of  his  Prince 
and  country  against  all  obstacles.  Sagacious  to 
view  into  the  remotest  consequences  of  things,  by 
which  all  difficulties  fly  before  him.  A  firm  friend, 
and  a  placable  enemy,  sacrificing  his  greatest  resent- 
ments, not  only  to  public  good,  but  to  common 
intercession  and  acknowledgment.  Yet  with  all 
these   virtues   it   must   be    granted,    there    is    some 


THE  CRISIS  AND  THE  CATASTROPHE  97 

mixture  of  human  infirmity.  His  greatest  admirers 
must  confess  his  skill  at  cards  and  dice  to  be  very 
low  and  superficial,  in  horse  racing  he  is  utterly 
ignorant;  thus,  to  save  a  few  millions  to  the  public,  he 
never  regards  how  many  worthy  citizens  he  hinders 
from  making  their  plum.  And  surely  there  is  one 
thing  never  to  be  forgiven  him,  that  he  delights 
to  have  his  table  filled  with  black  coats,  whom 
he  uses  as  if  they  were  gentlemen." 

Bolingbroke,  with  a  mental  and  moral  genius 
far  above  the  rest  of  his  time,  has  suffered  greatly 
from  the  criticism  of  the  sordidly  minded,  and, 
probably,  most  of  all,  from  the  contemporary 
judgment  of  Harley  and  his  admirers.  No  doubt 
Harley's  distrust  of  him  led  to  a  similar  attitude 
on  the  part  of  Swift,  for  he  never  felt  for  Bolingbroke 
the  affection  that  marked  his  friendship  with  Harley. 
Partly,  no  doubt.  Swift  was  repelled  by  a  mind  which, 
so  far,  overshadowed  his  own.  A  genius  like  that  of 
Swift  will  suffer  no  rival,  brook  no  superiority  either 
mental  or  social,  and  he  must  have  felt  himself  far 
below  Bolingbroke  in  every  way.  This  was,  perhaps, 
in  some  ways  extraordinary,  for  Bolingbroke  was  the 
only  one  of  Swift's  contemporaries  who  really  under- 
stood him.  It  may  have  been  that  these  two  men 
had  in  common  the  characteristic,  so  aptly  applied 
by  the  Lord  Treasurer  to  Swift,  of  an  "inverted 
hypocrisy."  It  is  possibly  the  attitude  of  life  which 
must  be  adopted  by  men  who  so  far  excel  their 
fellows  as  Swift  and  his  contemporary  did,  each  in 
their  own  sphere,  for  they  know  that  ordinary  men 

H 


98  DEAN   SWIFT 

will  not  believe  in  the  high  motives  which  really 
actuate  them.  Both  held  the  true  opinion  of  them- 
selves that  they  were  born  apart  from  the  ordinary 
run  of  human  beings,  both  felt  bitterly  the  loneliness 
which  this  entails  ;  both  have  suffered  from  the  con- 
temptuous criticism  of  those  who  neither  know  nor 
wish  to  know  them. 

Swift  speaks  enthusiastically  of  Bolingbroke.  "  It 
happens  to  very  few  men,  in  any  age  or  country,  to 
come  into  the  world  with  so  many  advantages  of 
nature  and  fortune  as  the  late  Secretary  Bolingbroke, 
descended  from  the  best  families  in  England,  heir 
to  a  great  patrimonial  estate,  of  a  sound  constitution, 
and  a  most  graceful,  amiable  person  :  but  all  these, 
had  they  been  of  equal  value,  were  infinitely  inferior 
in  degree  to  the  accomplishments  of  his  mind,  which 
was  adorned  with  the  choicest  gifts  that  God  has 
thought  fit  to  bestow  upon  the  children  of  men,  a 
strong  memory,  a  clear  judgment,  a  vast  range  of  wit 
and  fancy,  a  thorough  comprehension,  an  invincible 
eloquence,  with  a  most  agreeable  elocution.  He  had 
well  cultivated  all  these  talents  by  travel  and  study, 
the  latter  of  which  he  seldom  omitted  even  in  the 
midst  of  his  pleasures,  of  which  he  had,  indeed,  been 
too  great  and  criminal  a  pursuer :  for  although  he 
was  persuaded  to  leave  off  intemperance  in  wine, 
which  he  did  for  some  time  to  such  a  degree  that 
he  seemed  rather  abstemious,  yet  he  was  said  to 
allow  himself  other  liberties,  which  can  by  no  means 
be  reconciled  to  religion  or  morals,  whereof  I  have 
reason  to  believe  he  began  to  be  sensible.      But  he 


THE  CRISIS  AND  THE  CATASTROPHE   99 

was  fond  of  mixing   pleasure   and   business,  and  of 
being  esteemed  excellent  at  both  :  upon  which  account 
he  had  great  respect  for  the  characters  of  Alcibiades 
or  Petronius,  especially  the   latter,  whom  he  would 
be    gladly    thought    to    resemble.       His    detractors 
charged   him   with   some   degree  of  affectation,  and 
perhaps  not  altogether  without  grounds,  since  it  was 
hardly  possible  for  a  young  man,  with  half  the  busi- 
ness of  the  nation  upon  him,  and  the  applause  of  the 
whole,  to  escape  some  share  of  that  infirmity.     He 
had    been    early    bold    to    business,    was    an    artful 
negotiator,  and  perfectly  understood  foreign  affairs. 
But  what  I  have  often  wondered  at  in  a  man  of  his 
temper  was  his  prodigious  application  whenever  he 
thought  it  necessary :  for  he  would  plod  whole  days 
and  nights   like  the  lowest  clerk  in  an  office.     His 
talent  of  speaking  in  public,  for  which  he  was  so  very 
celebrated,  I  know  nothing  of,  except  from  the  infor- 
mation of  others :   but   understanding  men  of  both 
parties  have  assured  me  that  in  this  point,  in  their 
memory  and  judgment,  he  was  never  equalled." 

We  are  inclined  to  apply  to  Bolingbroke  his 
description  of  a  great  soul  in  the  Spirit  of  Patriotism. 
They  "come  into  the  world,  or  at  least  continue  in 
it  after  the  effects  of  surprise  and  inexperience  are 
over,  like  men  who  have  been  sent  on  more  important 
errands ;  they  observe  with  distinction,  they  admire 
with  knowledge.  They  may  indulge  themselves  in 
pleasure  :  but  as  their  industry  is  not  employed  about 
trifles,  so  their  amusements  are  not  made  the  business 
of  their  lives.      Such  men  cannot   pass   unperceived 


TOO  DEAN   SWIFT 

through  a  country.  If  they  retire  from  the  world, 
their  splendour  accompanies  them  and  enlightens 
even  the  obscurity  of  their  retreat.  If  they  take  a 
part  in  public  life,  the  effect  is  never  indifferent. 
They  either  appear  like  ministers  of  divine  vengeance, 
and  their  course  through  the  world  is  marked  by 
desolation  and  oppression,  by  poverty  and  servitude : 
or  they  are  the  guardian  angels  of  the  country  they 
inhabit,  busy  to  avert  even  the  most  distant  evil,  and 
to  maintain  or  to  procure  peace,  plenty,  and  the 
greatest  of  human  blessings,  liberty." 

Bolingbroke  stands  out  among  his  contemporaries 
absolutely  alone.  He  is  not  surrounded  by  a  small 
circle  of  admirers  like  Harley.  His  position  was  won 
and  maintained  purely  by  the  magnificence  of  his 
genius,  it  was  lost  through  the  jealousy  and  distrust 
of  those  who  did  not  understand  him.  His  conduct, 
after  his  downfall,  in  seeking  the  Jacobite  camp,  has 
left  him  open  to  the  suspicion  of  earlier  intrigues  on 
behalf  of  the  Pretender,  but  of  this  charge  he  stands 
once  and  for  all  acquitted  it  we  consider  that  such  a 
course  of  action  would  have  been  entirely  opposed 
to  the  dictates  of  common-sense,  and  therefore  quite 
out  of  the  question  for  a  man  of  Bolingbroke's 
character.  That  such  a  charge  should  have  been 
preferred  against  him  only  brings  on  those  who  have 
invented  it  the  onus  of  a  deliberate  failure  to  under- 
stand the  subtlety  of  the  intellect  of  the  man  whom 
they  have  placed  in  the  dock.  On  this  charge  and 
that  of  unfaithfulness  to  his  wife,  Bolingbroke's 
maligners  have  taken  their  stand.      Both  have  been 


THE   CRISIS  AND   THE  CATASTROPHE   loi 

so  ably  refuted  by  Mr.  Sichel,  that  it  is  unnecessary 
to  enter  into  them  further  here.  The  character  of 
Bolingbroke,  in  spite  of  the  warmest  of  warm 
defences,  will,  no  doubt,  always  be  open  to  the  finger 
of  calumny  because  of  his  greatness.  He  did  not 
stoop  to  the  undignified  courses  which  his  contem- 
poraries thought  it  no  shame  to  follow.  His  meteoric 
genius  fashed  through  history  at  a  speed  which  none 
could  overtake.  His  motives,  therefore,  could  not 
be  analyzed,  though  they  could  be  misunderstood : 
the  trail  of  the  meteor  has  been  seen  in  the  thought 
of  Voltaire,  in  the  poetry  of  Pope,  and  in  the  foreign 
policy  maintained  by  England  to  our  day.  Yet 
though  we  have  in  these  two  men,  on  whom  the  eyes 
of  all  England  were  turned  at  that  time,  two  entirely 
opposite  characters,  they  both  maintained  one  prin- 
ciple, that  government  by  faction  was  injurious  to 
the  country.  They  meant  to  unite  the  whole  country 
into  one  solid  phalanx,  in  spite  of  the  many  divisions 
of  New  Tory,  Old  Tory,  Jacobite  Tory,  and  a  dozen 
others.  Swift  ridicules  the  attempt  to  call  the  Tory 
administration  a  faction.  "  Is  that  a  faction  forsooth 
which  is  supported  by  Queen  and  Parliament  and  by 
nine-tenths  of  the  nation  ?  For  twenty  years  the 
nation  has  groaned  under  the  idolatrous  burden  of 
those  who  sucked  her  blood  for  gain,  we  have  carried 
on  wars  that  we  might  fill  the  pockets  of  stock- 
jobbers. We  have  revised  our  constitution,  and  by 
a  great  and  mighty  eftort  have  secured  our  Protestant 
succession,  only  that  we  may  become  the  tools  of  a 
faction,  who   arrogate  to  themselves  the  sole  merit 


102  DEAN   SWIFT 

of  what  was  a  national  act.  We  are  governed  by 
upstarts  who  are  unsettling  the  landmarks  of  our 
social  system,  and  are  displacing  thus  the  influence 
of  our  landed  gentry  by  that  of  a  class  of  men  who 
find  profit  in  their  woes.  If  the  late  discarded 
ministry  represented  anything,  they  represented  this, 
and  the  change  that  has  now  come  will  awaken  the 
nation  to  a  sense  of  its  mistakes,  and  will  recover 
the  rightful  influence  of  the  landed  gentry  and  will 
rid  us  of  the  pestilential  swarm  of  stock-jobbers 
who  are  confederate  with  the  Whigs."  "  These 
men  come  with  the  spirit  of  shopkeepers  to  frame 
rules  for  the  administration  of  kingdoms :  as  if 
they  thought  the  whole  art  of  government  consisted 
in  the  importation  of  nutmegs  and  the  curing  of 
herrings." 

In  this  way  the  new  Tory  writer  poured  forth 
his  volumes  of  wrath  in  the  pages  of  the  Examiner. 
This  was  a  weekly  paper  which  Swift  conducted 
from  November  2,  1710,  to  June  14,  171 1.  It  was 
an  appeal  to  the  nation  as  to  a  race  of  patriots  to 
support  their  country  irrespective  of  party,  and  to 
maintain  her  welfare  regardless  of  the  interests  of 
individuals. 

Doubtless  the  Tory  leaders  did  not  relinquish 
their  overtures  of  friendship  to  the  man  who  could 
thus  support  them.  The  Whigs  had  on  their  side 
Addison,  who  opposed  Swift  in  the  Whig  Examiner, 
but  the  Whig  writer  could  not  hope  to  outdo  Swift 
in  trenchant  and  convincing  argument.  Swift  had 
a    sledge-hammer    weapon.      In    his    pamphlets    he 


THE  CRISIS   AND  THE   CATASTROPHE  103 

acted  on  the  supposition  that  if  a  fact  were  expressed 
loudly,  emphatically,  and  in  a  new  way,  it  would 
appeal  to  his  readers,  and  the  truth  of  it  would,  in 
time,  dawn  on  them.  Their  temporary  value  was, 
therefore,  very  great,  though  to  us  they  appear 
perhaps  uninteresting.  For  clear,  trenchant,  forcible 
utterances  they  are  unequalled.  Given  a  cause 
which  he  thought  worthy,  none  could  equal  him 
in  defending  it,  and  the  cause  which  it  was  now 
his  duty  to  support  seemed  to  him  the  worthiest 
possible.  Bolingbroke  had  explained  to  him  the 
objects  and  working  of  the  new  Government,  and 
he  sympathized  fully  with  the  Tory  object  of  winning 
over  the  whole  nation  and  uniting  it  in  one  desire 
for  peace.  The  Whig  Government  had  involved  the 
country  in  war,  the  Tory  Government  must  lay 
stress  on  the  necessity  for  peace,  and  thus  what 
Swift  supported  because  it  appealed  to  all  his 
sympathies,  the  Tories  made  their  party  cry.  On 
the  whole  the  arrangement  was  a  convenient  one. 

It  is  not  wonderful  to  find  the  friendship  between 
Addison  and  Swift  gradually  growing  colder.  Up 
to  the  end  of  the  year  1710,  Swift's  letters  to  Stella 
contain  the  warmest  references  to  his  friends 
Addison  and  Steele.  The  first  hint  of  coolness 
comes  in  December.  "  I  had  been  hankering  with 
Mr.  Harley  to  save  Steele  his  other  employment, 
and  have  a  little  mercy  on  him,  and  I  had  been 
saying  the  same  thing  to  Lewis,  who  is  Mr.  Harley's 
chief  favourite.  Lewis  tells  Mr.  Harley  how  kindly 
I  should  take  it,  if  he  would  be  reconciled  to  Steele, 


104  DEAN   SWIFT 

etc.  Mr.  Harley  on  my  account  falls  in  with  it  and 
appoints  Steele  a  time  to  let  him  attend  him,  which 
Steele  accepts  with  great  submission,  but  never 
comes  nor  sends  any  excuse.  Whether  it  was 
blundering,  suUenness,  insolence,  or  rancour  of 
party,  I  cannot  tell :  but  I  shall  trouble  myself  no 
more  about  him.  I  believe  Addison  hindered  him 
out  of  mere  spite,  being  grated  to  the  soul  to  think 
he  should  ever  want  my  help  to  save  his  friend." 
A  few  months  later  a  coldness  of  some  duration 
was  established  between  them,  though  Swift  still 
appreciated  their  work.  "  Have  you  seen  the 
Spectator  yet?"  he  writes  to  Stella,  "a  paper  that 
comes  out  every  day  ?  'Tis  written  by  Mr.  Steele, 
who  seems  to  have  gathered  new  life,  and  have  a 
new  fund  of  wit :  it  is  in  the  same  nature  as  his 
Tatlers,  and  they  have  all  of  them  had  something 
pretty.  I  believe  Addison  and  he  club.  I  never 
see  them,  and  1  plainly  told  Mr.  Harley  and  Mr.  St. 
John  ten  days  ago,  before  my  Lord-keeper  and  Lord 
Rivers,  I  had  been  foolish  enough  to  spend  my 
credit  with  them  in  favour  of  Addison  and  Steele : 
but  that  I  would  engage  and  promise  never  to  say 
one  word  on  their  behalf,  having  been  used  so  ill 
for  what  I  had  already  done."  Yet  in  spite  of  this 
temporary  coldness.  Swift  and  Addison  became 
friends  again,  for  their  affection  for  one  another 
was  of  too  stable  a  character  to  be  easily  uprooted. 

No  doubt  Swift's  conscience  was  appeased  when 
his  friends  were  all  in  the  Tory  camp.  The  sincerity 
of  his  character  demanded  that  he  should  hold  the 


THE   CRISIS  AND   THE   CATASTROPHE  105 

same  opinions  in  every  way  as  those  whom  he 
admitted  on  terms  of  intimacy.  It  must  have  been 
difficult  for  him  to  remain  friends  with  those  over 
whose  pet  convictions  he  was  riding  rough-shod, 
and  whose  idol  he  was  trying  to  throw  down.  For, 
though  Addison  was  a  paid  writer  on  the  Whig  side, 
he  was,  throughout  his  career,  a  staunch  upholder 
of  the  best  of  the  Whig  principles.  He  was  not 
merely  a  stock-jobber,  his  politics  were  based  on 
convictions.  It  was  natural,  therefore,  that  he  and 
Swift,  who  both  held  serious  convictions,  should 
separate  for  the  time,  for  nothing  is  so  detrimental 
to  friendship  as  disagreement  on  politics  or  religious 
questions.  Yet  to  Stella  he  confessed  that  it  was 
something  of  a  trouble  to  him.  She  was  the  recipient 
of  all  his  small  troubles  and  anxieties.  To  her  he 
could  tell,  without  fear  of  repetition,  the  story  of 
any  temporary  coldness  on  the  part  of  his  patrons, 
for  the  days  in  which  coldness  on  the  part  of  those 
who  supported  him  could  make  him  anxious  were 
not  over  for  Swift.  It  was  merely  a  repetition  of 
the  days  at  Moor  Park  when  Sir  William  Temple 
held  the  place  which  Harley  held  now  in  Swift's 
esteem.  Swift's  bravado  in  boasting  of  his  power 
over  Harley  and  refusal  to  receive  him  back  into 
favour  without  a  humble  apology,  pointed  simply 
to  a  natural  anxiety  which  was  not  now  to  be 
manifested  in  his  pale  looks  and  trembling  de- 
meanour, as  in  the  days  of  his  dependence.  "  I 
called  on  Mr.  Secretary  to  see  what  the  devil  ailed 
him  on  Tuesday  :  I  made  him  a  very  proper  speech : 


io6  DEAN   SWIFT 

1  told  him  '  I  observed  he  was  much  out  of  temper : 
that  I  did  not  expect  he  would  tell  me  the  cause, 
but  would  be  glad  to  see  he  was  better.'  And  one 
thing  I  warned  him  of,  '  Never  to  appear  cold  to  me, 
for  I  would  not  be  treated  like  a  schoolboy :  that  I 
had  felt  too  much  of  it  in  my  life  (meaning  Sir 
William  Temple),  that  I  expected  every  great 
minister,  who  honoured  me  with  his  acquaintance, 
if  he  heard  or  saw  anything  to  my  disadvantage, 
would  let  me  know  in  plain  words,  and  not  put  me 
in  pain  to  guess  by  the  change  or  coldness  of  his 
countenance  or  behaviour :  for  it  was  what  I  would 
hardly  bear  from  a  crowned  head,  and  I  thought  no 
subject's  favour  was  worth  it :  and  that  I  designed 
to  let  my  lord  keeper,  Mr.  Harley,  know  the  same 
thing,  that  they  might  use  me  accordingly.  He 
took  all  right ;  said  I  had  reason  ;  vowed  nothing 
ailed  him  but  sitting  up  whole  nights  at  business 
and  one  night  at  drinking :  would  have  had  me  dine 
with  him  and  Mrs.  Masham's  brother,  to  make  up 
matters,  but  I  would  not." 

His  little  quarrels  with  Harley  and  St.  John  are 
related,  together  with  stories  of  that  "rogue  Patrick." 
"Did  not  I  tell  you  Patrick  has  got  a  bird,  a  linnet,  to 
carry  over  to  Dingley?  It  was  very  tame  at  first, 
and  'tis  now  the  wildest  I  ever  saw.  He  keeps  it  in 
a  closet,  where  it  makes  a  terrible  litter,  but  I  say 
nothing.  When  must  we  answer  our  M.D.'s  letter? 
one  of  these  odd-comeshortlies.  This  is  a  week  old, 
you  see,  and  no  farther  yet.  Mr.  Harley  desired  I 
would  drive  with  him  to-day,  but  I  refused  him,  for 


THE   CRISIS   AND   THE   CATASTROPHE  107 

I  fell  out  with  him  yesterday,  and  will  not  see  him 
again  till  he  makes  some  amends :  and  so  I  go 
to  bed." 

On  the  following  day  he  writes :  "  I  was  this 
morning  early  with  Mr.  Lewis  of  the  Secretary's 
Office,  and  saw  a  letter  Mr.  Harley  had  sent  to  him 
desiring  to  be  reconciled ;  but  I  was  deaf  to  all 
entreaties,  and  have  desired  Lewis  to  go  to  him,  and 
let  him  know  I  expect  further  satisfaction.  If  we  let 
these  great  ministers  pretend  too  much,  there  will  be 
no  governing  them.  He  promises  to  make  me  easy, 
if  I  will  but  come  and  see  him;  but  I  won't,  and  he 
shall  do  it  by  message,  or  I  will  cast  him  off."  He  is 
determined  by  sheer  self-assertion  to  maintain  his 
position,  even  at  the  expense  of  his  own  dignity. 
"I  dined  to-day  with  Mr.  Secretary  St.  John  :  I  went 
to  the  Court  of  Requests  at  noon,  and  sent  Mr. 
Harley  into  the  House  to  call  the  Secretary,  to  let 
him  know  I  would  not  dine  with  him  if  he  dined  late. 
By  good  luck  the  Duke  of  Argyle  was  at  the  lobby  of 
the  House  too,  and  I  kept  him  in  talk  till  the  Secretary 
came  out,  then  told  them  I  was  glad  to  see  them 
together,  and  that  I  had  a  request  to  the  Duke,  which 
the  Secretary  must  secondhand  his  grace  must  grant." 
Later  he  remarks,  "  I  have  taken  Mr.  Harley  into 
favour  again." 

It  must  have  taken  no  small  amount  of  forbearance 
on  the  part  of  the  leaders  of  the  ministry  to  endure 
such  treatment.  If  they  were  endowed  with  a  sense 
of  humour,  they  no  doubt  saw  the  comic  aspect  of  the 
Tory  Government  at  the  beck  and  call  of  this  upstart 


io8  DEAN   SWIFT 

clergyman,  who  met  with  little  favour  among  others 
of  his  cloth. 

"  A  clergyman  of  special  note, 
For  shunning  others  off  his  coat ; 
Which  made  his  brethren  of  the  gown 
Take  care  betimes  to  run  him  down." 

Yet  they  knew  that  they  must  keep  him  on  their 
side,  for  everything  depended  on  him ;  he  was  the  one 
man  for  their  purpose.  Swift  had,  perhaps,  reached 
one  height  of  his  ambition.  He  moved  on  what  to 
him  were  terms  of  equality  with  the  greatest  men  in 
the  kingdom.  He  was  far  above  any  of  his  fellow- 
writers.  As  a  clergyman  he  was  considered  to  be 
among  the  number  of  those  marked  out  for  the 
highest  promotion.  Socially  he  was  intimate  with 
the  most  important  frequenters  of  the  Court.  He  had 
already  begun  to  be  held  as  the  necessary  medium 
between  those  whose  favour  was  required  to  achieve 
position  and  those  who  desired  it.  His  next  achieve- 
ment was  for  him  even  more  than  this  ;  he  obtained 
the  logical  development  of  all  his  dreams,  and  became 
the  one  man  necessary  in  the  world  which  formed 
his  true  environment.  He  knew  that  the  one  thing 
necessary  to  establish  the  Tory  supremacy  was  to 
overthrow  Marlborough,  the  idol  of  the  Whig  party. 
Marlborough,  as  the  centre  of  Whig  interests,  neces- 
sarily performed  the  much-required  office  of  lode- 
stone.  All  eyes  were  turned  on  him,  and  on  his 
future  success  depended  the  Whig  power.  He  was 
typical  of  the  party  to  which  he  belonged.  The  war 
was    kept    going  as   a   speculation    by   the    monied 


THE  CRISIS  AND  THE  CATASTROPHE  109 

classes,  by  Whig  stock-jobbers,  who  knew  that 
success  in  this  branch  of  speculation  meant  enormous 
monetary  increase  for  their  own  pockets,  as  well  as  a 
great  measure  of  political  power.  In  Marlborough 
they  had  had  a  most  successful  managing  director,  he 
was  invaluable  to  them.  Now  that  they  had  lost  the 
ascendency  he  was  still  indispensable,  and  an  attack 
on  him  meant  a  most  serious  onslaught  on  the  main 
body  of  the  Whigs.  Thus  Swift  determined  to  attack 
him  in  a  wholly  equivocal  manner,  in  such  a  way  that 
he  might  perhaps  lead  the  Whigs  eventually  back  to 
support  the  Government  to  some  extent.  Peace  must 
be  achieved  at  any  cost,  peace  could  not  be  achieved 
without  the  fall  of  Marlborough.  Swift's  attitude  to 
Marlborough  is  characteristic.  He  recognized  the 
man's  real  greatness.  He  writes,  December,  17 10: 
"  I  was  early  this  morning  with  Secretary  St,  John 
...  he  told  me  he  had  been  with  the  Duke  of  Marl- 
borough, who  was  lamenting  his  former  wrong  step 
in  joining  with  the  Whigs,  and  said  he  was  worn  out 
with  age,  fatigue,  and  misfortunes.  I  swear  it  pitied 
me,  and  I  really  think  they  will  not  do  well  in  too 
much  mortifying  that  man,  although,  indeed,  it  is  his 
own  fault.  He  is  covetous  as  Hell,  and  ambitious  as 
the  prince  of  it :  he  would  fain  have  been  general  for 
life,  and  has  broken  all  endeavours  for  peace,  to  keep 
his  greatness  and  get  money." 

He  is  unwilling  that  Marlborough  should  be 
hardly  treated,  and  yet  he  wishes  to  have  peace. 
"  I  fear  people  will  begin  to  think  that  nothing 
thrives   under   this   ministry :    and    if   the    ministry 


no  DEAN  SWIFT 

can  once  be  rendered  odious  to  the  people,  the 
Parliament  may  be  chosen  Whig  or  Tory,  as  the 
Queen  pleases.  Then  I  think  our  friends  press  a 
little  too  hard  on  the  Duke  of  Marlborough.  The 
country  members  are  violent  to  have  past  faults 
inquired  into,  and  they  have  reason ;  but  I  do  not 
observe  the  ministry  to  be  very  fond  of  it.  In  my 
opinion  we  have  nothing  to  save  us  but  a  peace, 
and  I  am  sure  we  cannot  take  such  a  course  as 
we  hoped,  and  then  the  Whigs  will  bawl  what 
they  would  have  done  had  they  continued  in  power. 
I  tell  the  ministry  this  as  much  as  I  dare,  and  shall 
venture  to  say  a  little  more  to  them,  especially 
about  the  Duke  of  Marlborough,  who,  as  the  Whigs 
gave  out,  will  lay  down  his  command :  and  I  question 
whether  ever  any  wise  state  laid  aside  a  general 
who  had  been  successful  nine  years  together,  whom 
the  enemy  so  much  dreads,  and  his  own  soldiers 
cannot  help  believe  must  always  conquer ;  and  you 
know  that  in  war  opinion  is  nine  points  in  ten.  .  .  ." 
Once  more  Swift's  reason  came  into  contact  with 
his  politics.  The  interests  of  his  party,  on  the  sur- 
face, demanded  the  fall  of  Marlborough,  the  real 
welfare  of  the  nation  demanded  the  support  of  a 
reformed  Marlborough,  purged  of  the  vice  and 
avarice  which  Swift  considered  his  great  failing.  A 
letter  in  the  Examiner  to  Marlborough  under  the 
cognomen  "Crassus"  was  provoked  by  his  attempt 
to  obtain  a  life  Generalship.  He  grants  to  him 
"gracefulness  of  person  :  a  clear  understanding  culti- 
vated by  the  knowledge  of  men  and  manners."    "  He 


THE  CRISIS  AND  THE  CATASTROPHE  in 

is  no  ill  orator  in  the  Senate:"  he  is  said  "to  excel 
in  the  art  of  bridling  and  subduing  his  anger,  and 
stifling  or  concealing  his  resentment.  He  has  been 
a  most  successful  general,  of  long  experience,  great 
conduct,  and  much  personal  courage.  He  has  gained 
many  important  victories  for  the  commonwealth, 
and  forced  the  strongest  towns  in  Mesopotamia  to 
surrender,  for  which  frequent  supplications  have  been 
decreed  by  the  Senate.  Yet,  with  all  these  qualities, 
and  this  merit,  he  is  neither  beloved  by  the  patrician 
or  plebeians  at  home,  nor  by  the  officers  and  private 
soldiers  of  your  own  army  abroad."  He  proceeds 
then  to  point  out  that  the  failure  of  Crassus  is  due 
to  his  great  fault  avarice,  which  is  so  enormous  that 
against  it  his  virtues  are  nothing.  "The  moment 
you  quit  this  vice,"  he  concludes,  "you  will  be  a 
truly  great  man  :  and  still  there  will  be  imperfections 
enough  remaining  to  convice  us  you  are  not  a  god." 
We  cannot  help  being  struck  here  by  the  thought, 
overdrawn  though  the  comparison  may  be,  that  Swift 
is  merely  using  Marlborough's  name  to  cover  the 
Whig  party,  who  upheld  the  war  purely  from  the 
motive  of  self-interest.  For  this  sparing  eulogy  of 
Marlborough  he  received  a  stern  rebuke  from  the 
Tory  leaders.  "  Lord  Rivers,  talking  to  me  the  other 
day,  cursed  the  paper  called  the  Examiner  for  speak- 
ing civilly  of  the  Duke  of  Marlborough." 

The  Tories  stood  in  need  of  all  their  combined 
forces.  Even  if  the  Tory  party  had  been  united, 
the  ministry  was  not  yet  sufficiently  established 
to   have  any   feeling   of    permanency.      But   it   was 


112  DEAN   SWIFT 

supported  by  a  "kingdom  divided  against  itself,"  and 
its  insecurity  came  from  within.  There  was  a  set 
of  Tories  to  whom  Swift  referred  when  he  wrote 
to  Stella  :  "  This  (Lord  Rivers'  anger)  I  happened 
to  talk  of  to  the  Secretary,  who  blamed  the  warmth 
of  that  lord,  and  some  others,  and  swore  that,  if 
their  advice  was  followed,  they  would  be  blown  up 
in  twenty-four  hours." 

This  ill-judged  set  consisted  for  the  most  part  of 
country  squires— middle-aged,  hot-headed,  stupid — 
who  wished  to  drive  the  Government  into  extreme 
measures.  For  expressing  their  opinions  they  had 
banded  themselves  into  the  October  Club,  where 
they  aired  their  grievances  with,  no  doubt,  much 
liquid  nourishment.  They  were,  in  spite  of — or 
perhaps  more  correctly,  because  of — their  incapacity, 
a  great  source  of  danger  to  the  Tory  party,  for 
they  were  utterly  unwise  in  their  methods,  and  from 
them,  no  doubt,  came  many  unwise  utterances,  very 
detrimental  to  the  safety  of  their  party.  "  We  are 
plagued  here,"  says  Swift,  "with  an  October  Club, 
that  is,  a  set  of  above  a  hundred  Parliament  men  of 
the  country,  who  drink  October  beer  at  home,  and 
meet  every  evening  at  a  tavern  near  the  Parliament, 
to  consult  affairs,  and  drive  things  on  to  extremes 
against  the  Whigs,  to  call  the  old  ministry  to  account 
and  get  off  five  or  six  heads."  The  obstinacy  of  the 
Queen  also  served  to  make  the  Tory  position  critical. 
She  had  been  so  much  kept  in  subjection  by  the 
Whig  Government  that  she  was  determined  to  avoid 
the  possibility  of  a  repetition  of  Ministerial  tyranny, 


THE   CRISIS  AND  THE   CATASTROPHE  113 

and  was  most  intractable.  "They  "  (the  Tories)  "  have 
cautioned  the  Queen  so  much  against  being  governed 
that  she  observes  it  too  much."  The  Whig  Somers 
was  once  more  ingratiating  himself  in  favour  with 
the  Queen,  and  the  Tories  had  a  formidable  an- 
tagonist in  the  Duchess  of  Somerset,  who  was  the 
favourite  then  in  power.  The  Tory  position  was 
extremely  critical  when,  as  they,  no  doubt,  looked 
upon  it  three  weeks  afterwards,  by  the  kindly  inter- 
vention of  providence,  an  attempt  was  made  to 
assassinate  Harley.     The  ministry  was  safe. 

Swift  was  overwhelmed.  "  Oh  dear  M.  D.,  my 
heart  is  almost  broken.  You  will  hear  the  thing 
before  this  comes  to  you.  I  write  a  full  account 
of  it  this  night  to  the  Archbishop  of  Dublin,  and 
the  Dean  may  tell  you  the  particulars  from  the 
Archbishop.  I  was  in  a  sorry  way  to  write,  but 
thought  it  might  be  proper  to  send  a  true  account 
of  the  fact ;  for  you  will  hear  a  thousand  lying 
circumstances.  It  is  of  Mr.  Harley's  being  stabbed 
this  afternoon  at  three  o'clock  at  a  committee  of  the 
Council."  Swift's  affectionate  soul  was  wrung  with 
grief  "  Pray  pardon  my  distraction  !  I  now  think 
of  all  his  kindness  to  me — the  poor  creature  now 
lies  stabbed  in  his  bed  by  a  desperate  Popish  villain." 

The  Marquis  of  Guiscard,  who  had  tried  to 
murder  Harley,  had  a  grievance  against  Govern- 
ment, and  especially  against  St.  John,  and  on  the 
occasion  of  his  own  arraignment  before  the  Council 
had  intended  to  assassinate  the  Secretary,  who, 
however   had   taken    Harley's  place  at  the  Council, 


114  DEAN   SWIFT 

and  thus  Harley  had  fallen  the  easier  victim.  "  He 
had,"  says  Swift,  "committed  several  enormities 
in  France,  was  extremely  prodigal  and  vicious,  of 
a  dark,  melancholy  complexion,  and  cloudy  counte- 
nance, such  as  in  vulgar  physiognomy  is  called  an 
ill-look.  For  the  rest,  his  talents  were  very  mean, 
having  a  sort  of  inferior  cunning,  but  very  small 
abilities,  so  that  a  great  man  of  the  late  ministry  by 
whom  he  was  invited  over,  and  with  such  discretion 
raised  at  first  step  from  a  profligate  popish  priest 
to  a  lieutenant-general,  and  colonel  of  a  regiment 
of  horses,  was  forced  at  last  to  drop  him  for  shame." 
Swift  graphically  describes  the  incident.  "A 
great  minister  in  high  confidence  with  the  Queen, 
under  whose  management  the  weight  of  affairs  at 
present  is  in  a  great  measure  supposed  to  lie,  sitting 
in  council  in  a  royal  palace,  with  a  dozen  chief 
officers  of  the  State,  is  stabbed  at  the  very  board 
in  the  execution  of  his  office  by  the  hand  of  a 
French  papist,  then  under  examination  for  high 
treason.  The  assassin  redoubles  his  blow  to  make 
sure  work,  and  concluding  the  Chancellor  was 
dispatched,  goes  on  with  the  same  rage  to  murder 
a  principal  secretary  of  state,  and  that  whole 
noble  assembly  are  forced  to  rise,  and  draw  their 
swords  in  their  own  defence,  as  if  a  wild  beast  had 
been  let  loose  among  them."  There  was  political 
intent  in  his  description  of  Harley's  behaviour. 
"After  the  wound  was  given,  he  (Harley)  was 
observed  neither  to  change  his  countenance,  nor  dis- 
cover  any  concern   or  disorder   in   his  speech :    he 


THE  CRISIS   AND   THE   CATASTROPHE  115 

rose  up,  and  walked  along  the  room  while  he  was 
able,  with  the  greatest  tranquillity,  during  the 
midst  of  the  confusion.  When  the  surgeon  came, 
he  took  him  aside  and  desired  he  would  inform  him 
freely  whether  the  wound  was  mortal,  because  in 
that  case,  he  had  some  affairs  to  settle,  relating 
to  his  family.  The  blade  of  the  pen-knife,  broken 
by  the  violence  of  the  blow  against  a  rib,  within  a 
quarter  of  an  inch  of  the  handle,  was  dropt  out  (I 
know  not  whether  from  the  wound,  or  his  clothes) 
as  the  surgeon  was  going  to  dress  him ;  he  ordered 
it  to  be  taken  up,  and  wiping  it  himself,  gave  it 
somebody  to  keep,  saying,  he  thought  'it  now 
properly  belonged  to  him.'  He  shewed  no  sort 
of  resentment,  or  spoke  one  violent  word  against 
Guiscard,  but  appeared  all  the  while  the  least 
concerned  of  any  in  the  company — a  state  of  mind 
which,  in  such  an  exigency,  nothing  but  innocence 
can  give,  and  is  truly  worthy  of  a  Christian  philo- 
sopher." 

Swift,  indeed,  knew  how  to  make  full  use  of  this 
accident  on  the  side  of  the  ministry.  He  won  over 
the  whole  country  for  the  time,  by  a  dexterous 
appeal  to  their  emotions.  The  Tory  fortunes,  how- 
ever, waned  once  more  in  the  suspicion  of  an 
intrigue.  Prior  had  been  sent  to  Paris  with  power 
to  negotiate  for  peace.  It  is  said  that  Swift  was 
ignorant.  He  was  required,  however,  to  keep  the 
Whigs  off  the  scent,  and  for  this  purpose  wrote  a 
mock  account  of  Prior's  mission  after  his  return. 
The  Opposition,  however,    were    not    to    be   easily 


ii6  DEAN   SWIFT 

cheated,    and   determined   to   make  a  final  struggle. 
They  had  the  House  of  Lords  on  their  side,  and  were 
strong   in   the   combination   of    Somers,  Godolphin, 
Marlborough   and    Nottingham.      If   they   had   had 
Swift  they  would  undoubtedly  have   prevailed,  but 
Swift  was  working  on  the  other  side,  and  brought  off 
a  coiip  d'etat  which   almost  ensured  the  balance  on 
the   side   of   the   ministry.     The   final   contest  took 
place  in  the  autumn  of  171 1.     The  Whig  pamphlets 
were  answered  once  for  all  by  Swift's  great  work, 
"  The  Conduct  of  the  Allies,"  in  which  he  developed 
more  fully,  and  with  greater  perfection  of  style,  the 
work  begun   in    the  Examiner.       He    ascribed    the 
failure   of  the  war  to  the   corruption   of  the  Whig 
leaders.      The   pamphlet  appealed    to    the    popular 
taste,  and  all  would  have  gone  well  had  it  not  been 
for   Harley's  lack   of    capacity   for   decisive   action. 
He  allowed  the   Whigs    to   obtain   a  majority  and 
Nottingham  to  move  an  amendment  that  no  peace 
would   be   safe   which   left   Spain   to  the  Bourbons. 
For  the  moment  the  Tory  outlook  was  hopeless.    The 
leaders   suspected    the    Queen    of   leanings   to   the 
Whig  side.     "I  was  this  morning  with  Mr.   Secre- 
tary," writes  Swift.     "We  are  both  of  opinion  that 
the  Queen  is  false.      I  told  him  what  I  had  heard, 
and  he  confirmed  it  by  other  circumstances.     I  then 
went  to  my  friend  Lewis,  who  had  sent  to  see  me. 
He   talks   of  nothing   but  retiring  to   his   estate  in 
Wales.      He  gave   me  reason  to  believe  the  whole 
matter    is    settled    between    the    Queen    and    the 
Whigs;     he    hears    that    Lord    Somers    is    to    be 


THE   CRISIS  AND   THE   CATASTROPHE  117 

Treasurer,  and  believes,  that  sooner  than  turn  out 
the    Duchess   of    Somerset,    she    will  dissolve    the 
Parliament,   and   get   a    Whiggish    one,    which   may 
be  done  by  managing  elections."      Both  Harley  and 
St.    John    were    trembling    for    their    own    safety, 
though  they  affected  tranquillity.      All  three  knew 
that  affairs  were  being  managed  simply  by  a  woman, 
that  everything  depended  on  the  ambitions  of   the 
Duchess  of  Somerset.      If  she  were  overthrown  it 
might  yet  go  well  with  the  ministry.     Swift  there- 
fore determined  on  a  stroke  of  policy  which,  at  the 
expense    of    ruining    his    personal    hopes   for  ever, 
might    overthrow   the    Duchess    and    buoy   up   the 
Government.      He  wrote  the  "  Windsor  Prophecy," 
in  which  he  made  an  open  attack  on  the  Duchess. 
Unfortunately  for  himself  an  after-thought  of  recall- 
ing it  from    publication  was  impossible,   and  a  few 
copies  were  spread  abroad.      It  was  a  mistake,  for  it 
only  irritated    the   Duchess,   and   through    her,   the 
Queen.      It  did  not,  however,  have  any  effect  on  the 
fortunes    of   the   Government.       On    December   29, 
they   achieved    an    enormous   victory   which    Swift 
describes  to  Stella :   "  I  have  broken  open  my  letter, 
and  tore  it  into  the  bargain,  to  let  you  know  we  are 
all  safe ;   the  Queen  has  made  no  less  than  twelve 
lords,  to  have  a  majority ;    nine  new  men,  the  other 
three  peers'  sons,  and  has  turned  out  the  Duke  of 
Somerset.     She  is  awakened  at  last,  and  so  is  Lord 
Treasurer  (Harley) ;  I  want  nothing  now  but  to  see 
the  Duchess  out.     But  we  shall  do  without  her.     We 
are  all  extremely  happy.     Give  me  joy,  sirrahs." 


ii8  DEAN   SWIFT 

Three  days  later  Marlborough  was  "turned  out 
of  all  his  employments,"  though  Somerset  was  not 
overthrown,  and  the  Tory  ministry,  with  this  excep- 
tion, could  congratulate  itself  on  the  achievement  of 
its  highest  aspirations.  The  great  struggle  was 
over.  With  the  end  of  the  struggle  came  the 
end  of  the  need  of  Tory  enterprise  and  energy. 
Throughout  history  it  has  been  true  that  an  external 
enemy  maintains  internal  health  and  prosperity,  and 
that  absence  of  danger  from  outside  induces  men  to 
invent  an  internal  peril.  National  nerves  must  always 
be  calmed  by  real  peril. 

"  Satan  finds  some  mischief  still 
For  idle  hands  to  do." 

In  the  case  of  Swift,  it  seemed  as  though  he  had 
strung  himself  up  for  the  fight,  and  that  when  the 
strain  was  removed,  by  a  natural  reaction,  his 
strength  and  capacity  failed.  The  "  Conduct  of  the 
Allies  "  was  the  climax  of  his  pamphleteering  cam- 
paign. The  crisis  was  over,  the  catastrophe  had 
begun,  though  it  was  not  yet  apparent  to  the  ordi- 
nary observer.  What  did  the  ordinary  observer 
see  ?  A  self-assertive  person,  who  was  manifestly 
of  obscure  origin,  claiming  equality  with  those 
evidently  far  above  him  in  social  position.  To  them 
he  seemed  to  think  that  the  best  way  of  asserting  his 
superiority  was  to  assume  an  attitude  of  almost 
vulgar  familiarity  in  public  with  the  Tory  leaders ;  he 
would  send  them  on  messages,  would  refuse  their 
invitations  to  dinner,  except  on  his  own  condition, 
and  would  frequently  pretend  to  be  insulted  by  some 


THE   CRISIS   AND   THE   CATASTROPHE  119 

remark  of  theirs,  and  refuse  to  forgive  them  for  days 
together,  taking  great  care  to  give  as  much  publicity 
as  possible  to  the  whole  affair.  It  was  the  elementary 
expression  of  a  certain  simplicity  of  disposition  which 
characterized  Swift  throughout  his  life,  and  which, 
though  it  was  sometimes  of  an  unpleasant  nature, 
for  the  most  part  added  charm  to  his  demeanour. 
It  was,  perhaps,  the  simplicity  of  genius.  On  the 
other  side,  we  see  the  greatest  genius  of  his  time, 
who  had  risen  to  the  highest  possible  position  purely 
by  means  of  his  attainments  ;  a  man  who  could  hold 
the  world  at  his  beck  and  call,  to  whom  all  bowed 
as  to  their  superior.  It  was  to  Swift  that  the  vic- 
torious general  Peterborough  first  paid  homage  on 
his  return  to  England.  Swift  was  sought  out  by 
foreign  ambassadors  a  few  months  later  to  receive 
the  thanks  and  good  will  of  their  royal  masters. 
His  was  a  name  which  rang  throughout  Europe  as 
the  name  of  the  man  who  could  move  mountains. 
On  his  efforts  had  depended  the  fate  of  a  whole 
party.  It  was  owing  to  his  steadfast  allegiance  to 
her  interests  that  the  cause  of  the  Church  was 
strengthened  and  established.  He  was  praised  and 
lauded  by  every  one  of  importance.  Oxford  and 
Bolingbroke  looked  on  him  as  their  truest  friend  ; 
both  had  a  genuine  affection  for  him.  Bolingbroke 
wrote  to  him  in  1716:  "  It  is  a  very  great  truth  that 
among  all  the  losses  which  I  have  sustained,  none 
affected  me  more  sensibly  than  that  of  your  company 
and  correspondence :  and  yet,  even  now,  I  should 
not  venture  to  write  to  you,  did  not  you  provoke  mc 


I20  DEAN   SWIFT 

to  it  Your  letter  breathes  the  same  spirit,  as  your 
conversation  at  all  times  inspired,  even  when  the 
occasions  of  practising  the  severest  rules  of  virtuous 
fortitude  seemed  most  remote.  Adieu,  dear  friend ; 
may  the  kindest  influence  of  Heaven  be  shed  upon 
you.  Whether  we  may  ever  meet  again,  that  Heaven 
only  knows  :  if  we  do,  what  millions  of  things  shall 
we  have  to  talk  over.  In  the  meanwhile,  believe 
that  nothing  sits  so  near  to  my  heart  as  my  country 
and  my  friends,  and  that  among  these  you  ever  had, 
and  shall  have,  a  principal  place."  In  another  letter 
he  wrote :  "  I  know  not  whether  the  love  of  fame 
increases  as  we  advance  in  age :  sure  I  am  that  the 
force  of  friendship  does.  I  loved  you  almost  twenty 
years  ago :  I  thought  of  you  as  well  as  I  do  now : 
better  was  beyond  the  power  of  conception  :  or,  to 
avoid  an  equivoque,  beyond  the  extent  of  my  ideas." 
The  correspondence  between  these  two  men  throws 
a  strong  light  on  the  "inverted  hypocrisy"  which 
characterized  both,  and  though  we  must  perforce 
regret  the  publication  of  intimate  correspondence  as 
a  tasteless  slight  to  the  authors  of  it,  yet,  in  the  case 
of  Swift,  we  cannot  do  without  it.  In  few  cases  has 
it  been  so  important  to  know  that  side  of  the  man 
which  is  unconsciously  given  to  another.  Perhaps 
he  was  only  really  known  and  understood  by  two 
people,  Stella  and  Bolingbroke,  for  undoubtedly 
Bolingbroke  knew  him  much  better  than  Oxford. 
The  true  altruist  is  never  understood  by  his  genera- 
tion, seldom  by  posterity ;  even  his  intimate  friends, 
who  are  necessarily  few  in  number,  if  in  the  plural 


THE  CRISIS   AND   THE   CATASTROPHE  121 

at  all,  only  recognize  a  certain  appreciable  benevo- 
lence,   while    the    great    principle    underlying   it   is 
utterly  disregarded.     Shelley  and  Swift  are,  perhaps, 
the  two  best  examples  of  the  altruist  entirely   mis- 
understood both   by   their   own   time  and   posterity. 
They  were  equally  altruists,  though  in  an  extraordi- 
narily different  way.     It  is  much  pleasanter  to  think 
of  this  side  of  Swift's  character,  than  of  the  politician 
and  statesman  ;  even  the  satirist  is  less  pleasing  to 
our  consideration  than  the  friend  and  philanthropist. 
The   greatness  which   appeals  to  the  world  always 
has    its   seamy    side,   but    neither    Swift's    bitterest 
detractors  nor  the  foolishly  mischievous,  who  abuse 
him  through  ignorance,  can  quarrel  with  his  love  of 
his  willows  at  Laracor.     Even  at  the  time  when  he 
was  watching,  with  all  the  keenness  of  a  participator, 
the  tremendous   struggle   of   parties   on   which   the 
foreign  policy  of  England  depended,  he  could  still 
write  to  his  women  friends  at  Laracor  in  the  "little" 
language.     He  would  describe  the  beauty  of  the  early 
spring,  chatter  about  his  dinners,  gossip  about  his 
household    arrangements    and    theirs,    and    execute 
all  their  various  commissions.     The  great  politician 
occupying   his    mind   with  ladies'  aprons   offers   an 
amusing   picture.      All   his   walks   are   described   to 
them,  and  his  rides  to  and  from  Chelsea.     Fairy  tales 
at  times  formed  his  relaxation.     His  favourite  recrea- 
tion was  to  study  the  idiosyncrasies  of  human  nature, 
the  drunken  bouts  of  his   servant  Patrick,  and   the 
little  foibles  of  ladies  of  his  acquaintance.     Life  was 
the   stage   which    he    liked   to    contemplate,   human 


122  DEAN   SWIFT 

beings  the  actors  whose  characteristics  formed  his 
amusement.  As  nothing  was  too  great  for  him, 
nothing  was  too  trifling.  If  he  had  been  a  poet,  he 
would  have  been  the  poet  of  children  ;  if  convention 
in  literature  had  allowed  of  nonsense  verse.  Swift 
would  have  been  pre-eminently  the  nonsense  writer. 
In  prose  he  revels  in  it.  His  early  friendship  for 
Stella  points  to  the  mind  that  understood  children. 
"  Gulliver's  Travels "  confirms  the  idea.  Francis 
Thompson  thus  defines  the  childlike  imagination, 
"Know  you  what  it  is  to  be  a  child?  It  is  to  be 
something  very  different  from  the  man  of  to-day.  It 
is  to  have  a  spirit  yet  streaming  from  the  waters  of 
baptism ;  it  is  to  believe  in  love,  to  believe  in  love- 
liness, to  believe  in  belief:  it  is  to  be  so  little  that 
the  elves  can  reach  to  whisper  in  your  ear :  it  is  to 
turn  pumpkins  into  coaches,  and  mice  into  horses, 
lowness  into  loftiness,  and  nothing  into  everything, 
for  each  child  has  its  fairy  godmother  in  its  own 
soul ;  it  is  to  live  in  a  nutshell,  and  to  count  yourself 
the  king  of  infinite  grace ;  it  is 

'  To  see  a  world  in  a  grain  of  sand, 
And  a  heaven  in  a  wild  flower, 
Hold  infinity  in  the  palm  of  your  hand, 
And  eternity  in  an  hour  ; ' 

it  is  to  know  not  as  yet  that  you  are  under  sen- 
tence of  life,  nor  petition  that  it  be  commuted  into 
death." 

A  power  of  this  kind  enabled  Swift  to  write 
"  Gulliver's  Travels  "  and  the  "Battle  of  the  Books." 
Had  his  imagination  been  also  that  of  the  poet  we 


THE   CRISIS   AND   THE   CATASTROPHE  123 

should  have  had  from  him  sublime  works,  but  then 
we  should  not  have  had  "Gulliver's  Travels."  An 
exclamation  of  horror  will  no  doubt  come  from  the 
mouths  of  many  who  hear  that  the  greatest  of  Swift's 
works  was  written  by  a  man  who  knew  what  it  was 
to  "believe  in  love,  to  believe  in  loveliness:  and  to 
believe  in  belief."  Swift  knew  all  these  things.  It  is 
and  has  always  been  our  misfortune  that  we  have 
had  before  us  and  been  commanded  to  look  at,  the 
Swift  represented  by  the  garbled  and  distorted 
account  of  him  given  by  Lord  Orrery.  In  this  have 
originated  most  of  the  untrue  representations  of  the 
man.  The  charge  of  snobbishness,  which  one  hears 
levied  against  him  by  those,  perhaps,  who  have  never 
read  one  word  of  his  works,  and  perhaps  have  only 
been  acquainted  with  him  as  portrayed  in  histories 
for  students,  is  utterly  untrue.  The  slightest  know- 
ledge of  the  real  Swift  for  ever  refutes  it.  His 
attitude  to  his  superiors  was  an  attitude  never  found 
in  snobbish  people.  It  has  its  place  in  the  character 
of  the  most  simple  people.  It  is  a  characteristic 
which  always  accompanies  simplicity.  It  is  part  of 
the  mind  which  loves  to  look  on  and  talk  about 
those  in  high  places,  not  as  they  are  brought  into  a 
subjective  connection,  but  simply  as  beings  greater 
than  the  speaker.  It  is  the  feeling  which  the  valet 
has  for  his  titled  master.  It  implies  an  enormous 
capacity  for  reverence  of  an  elementary  kind.  It  is 
essentially  a  childlike  quality,  without  a  vestige  of 
the  scheming  which  accompanies  the  ultra-British 
quality  of  snobbishness.     Thus  Swift  can  in  no  sense 


134  DEAN   SWIFT 

be  termed  snobbish.  The  delight  which  he  took  in 
his  position  of  equality  with  the  great  was  only  the 
inevitable  reaction  from  the  subordinate  position  ol 
his  youth,  and  while  he  revelled  in  high  places  his 
interests  at  the  same  time  lay  in  the  little  things  of 
earth,  and  his  deepest  affection  was  centred  on  a 
woman  of  mean  birth  and  indifferent  surroundings, 
whom  he  loved  to  introduce  to  his  most  distinguished 
friends. 

His  willows  at  Laracor  were  not  allowed  to 
engross  him  long.  There  were  other  and  more  im- 
portant things  at  stake.  The  Government  began  to 
assume  the  character  of  a  house  divided  against  itself. 
Swift  was  standing  on  a  dizzy  pinnacle  dispensing 
favours  right  and  left.  The  higher  the  rank  of  a 
would-be  new  acquaintance  the  greater  the  con- 
descension expected  from  him.  A  Duke  must  humble 
himself  most  of  all  before  this  audacious  parson. 
"  Mr.  Secretary  told  me  the  Duke  of  Buckingham  had 
been  talking  to  him  much  about  me,  and  desired  my 
acquaintance.  I  answered  it  could  not  be,  for  he  had 
not  made  sufficient  advances.  Then  the  Duke  of 
Shrewsbury  said  he  thought  that  the  Duke  was  not 
used  to  make  advances.  I  said  I  could  not  help  that ; 
for  I  always  expected  advances  in  proportion  to 
men's  quality  and  more  from  a  Duke  than  from  other 
men.  The  Duke  replied  that  he  did  not  mean  any- 
thing of  his  quality,  which  was  handsomely  said 
enough,  for  he  meant  his  pride ;  and  I  have  invented 
a  notion  to  believe  that  nobody  is  proud." 

Swift's   form   of  pride  was   an  essentially  useful 


THE   CRISIS  AND   THE  CATASTROPHE  125 

one.  Unlike  other  men  who  have  risen  from  nothing, 
he  did  not  spurn  his  poor  acquaintances.  The  Tory 
leaders  humorously  complained  that  he  never  came 
to  see  them  "  without  a  Whig  in  his  sleeve."  Besides 
those  whom  he  knew  intimately  there  were  a 
thousand  others  who  sought  for  his  help.  The  fallen 
Sacheverell,  for  whom  Swift  had  little  liking,  obtained 
a  favour  for  his  brother.  Swift,  in  a  parody  on  one  of 
Horace's  Odes,  aptly  describes  the  situation  : — 

"  I  get  a  whisper  to  withdraw 
When  twenty  fools  I  never  saw 
Come  with  petitions  fairly  penned, 
Desiring  I  would  stand  their  friend. 

This  humbly  offers  me  his  case, 
That  begs  my  interest  for  a  place, 
A  hundred  other  men's  affairs 
Like  bees  are  humming  in  my  ears. 

'  To-morrow  my  appeal  comes  on  : 
Without  your  help,  the  cause  is  gone — ' 
'  The  Duke  expects  my  lord  and  you 
About  some  great  affairs  at  two.' 

'  Put  my  Lord  Bolingbroke  in  mind 
To  get  my  warrant  quickly  signed  ; 
Consider,  too,  my  first  request.' 
'  Be  satisfied,  I'll  do  my  best.' 
Then  presently  he  falls  to  teaze. 
'  You  may  for  certain  if  you  please, 
I  doubt  not,  if  his  lordship  knew. 
And,  Mr.  Dean,  one  word  from  you.' " 

A  contemporary  picture  is  given  by  Bishop 
Kennet  in  1713. 

"  Swift  came  into  the  coffee-house,  and  had  a  bow 
from  everybody  but  me.  When  I  came  to  the  ante- 
chamber to  wait  before  prayers,  Dr.  Swift  was  the 
principal   man   of  talk   and    business,   and   acted   as 


126  DEAN   SWIFT 

minister  of  requests.  He  was  soliciting  the  Earl  of 
Arran  to  speak  to  his  brother,  the  Duke  of  Ormond 
to  get  a  chaplain's  place  established  in  the  garrison 
of  Hull,  for  Mr.  Fidders,  a  clergyman  in  that  neigh- 
bourhood, who  had  lately  been  in  jail  and  published 
sermons  to  pay  fees.  He  was  promising  Mr.  Thorold 
to  undertake  with  my  Lord  Treasurer  that  according 
to  his  petition  he  should  obtain  a  salary  of  ;^2oo  per 
annum,  as  minister  of  the  English  Church  at  Rotter- 
dam. He  stopped  F.  Gwynne,  Esq.,  going  in  with 
the  red  bag  to  the  Queen,  and  told  him  aloud  he  had 
something  to  say  to  him  from  my  Lord  Treasurer. 
He  talked  with  the  son  of  Dr.  Davenant  to  be  sent 
abroad,  and  took  out  his  pocket-book,  and  wrote 
down  several  things  as  memoranda,  to  do  for  him. 
He  turned  to  the  fire,  and  took  out  his  gold  watch, 
and  telling  him  the  time  of  day,  complained  it  was 
very  late.  A  gentleman  said  'it  was  too  fast.' 
'  How  can  I  help  it,'  says  the  Doctor,  *  if  the  courtiers 
give  me  a  watch  that  won't  go  right  ? '  Then  he 
instructed  a  young  nobleman  that  the  best  poet 
in  England  was  Mr.  Pope  (a  Papist),  who  had  begun 
a  translation  of  Homer  into  English  verse,  for  which 
he  said  he  must  have  them  all  subscribe.  *  For,'  says 
he,  'the  author  sJiall  not  begin  to  print  till  I  have 
a  thousand  guineas  for  him.'  Lord  Treasurer,  after 
leaving  the  Queen,  came  through  the  room  beckoning 
Dr.  Swift  to  follow  him ;  both  went  off  just  after 
prayers." 

Yet,   though   Swift's   enemies    maligned   him   for 
ostentatious    display   of   influence,   and    his   friends 


THE   CRISIS  AND  THE   CATASTROPHE  127 

good-humouredly  complained  of  his  unceasing  im- 
portunity, the  efforts  which  roused  against  him  these 
attacks  had  their  solid  fruit  in  very  material  benefits 
conferred  on  his  friends  and  acquaintances.  Swift 
had  an  extraordinary  facility  for  making  the  cause  of 
other  people  peculiarly  his  own.  When  his  interest 
was  once  roused  in  any  one  who  needed  his  help 
he  would  enter  into  and  thoroughly  understand  the 
needs  of  that  person.  Thus  it  was  in  the  case  of 
William  Harrison  the  young  poet,  whom  "  he  set  up 
in  a  new  Tatler.''  Later/through  Swift's  introduction 
to  St.  John,  Harrison  was  appointed  secretary  to 
Lord  Raby,  and  afterwards  Queen's  Secretary  at  the 
Hague,  which,  as  his  patron  said,  was  the  finest 
office  going  for  a  young  man.  Unknown  to  Swift, 
however,  it  was  a  mirage,  for  the  promised  salary 
remained  unpaid  so  long  that  Harrison  was  almost 
reduced  to  starvation.  A  fever  acting  upon  a  con- 
stitution weakened  by  deprivation  carried  off  Swift's 
protege,  and  reduced  Swift  to  despair.  Perhaps  one 
of  his  most  striking  characteristics  lies  in  the  fact 
that,  experienced  man  of  the  world  as  he  was,  he 
could  be  thrown  into  the  deepest  grief  by  the  mis- 
fortunes of  others.  The  details  of  personal  losses 
could  move  him,  though  he  desired  to  move  in  a 
world  of  big  principles  and  wide  issues.  Without 
any  undue  boasting  he  could  write  to  Stella,  "  Do 
you  know  I  have  taken  more  pains  to  recommend 
the  Whig  wits  to  the  favour  and  mercy  of  the 
ministers,  than  any  other  people.  Steele  I  have 
kept  in  his  place.     Congreve  I  have  got  to  be  used 


128  DEAN   SWIFT 

kindly  and  secured.  Rowe  I  have  recommended  and 
got  a  promise  of  a  place.  Phillips  I  should  certainly 
have  provided  for,  if  he  had  not  run  party  mad, 
and  made  me  withdraw  my  recommendations.  I 
set  Addison  so  right  at  first  that  he  might  have  been 
employed,  and  have  partly  secured  him  the  place 
he  has."  He  relates  more  particularly  what  he  has 
done  for  Congreve.  "  I  went  late  to  town  to-day, 
and  dined  with  my  friend  Lewis.  I  saw  Will  Con- 
greve attending  at  the  Treasury,  by  order,  with  his 
brethren,  the  Commissioners  of  the  Wine  Licenses. 
I  had  often  mentioned  him  with  kindness  to  Lord 
Treasurer,  and  Congreve  told  me  that  after  they 
had  answered  to  what  they  were  sent  for  my  Lord 
called  him  privately  and  spoke  to  him  with  great 
kindness,  promising  his  protection,  etc.  The  poor 
man  said  he  had  been  used  so  ill  of  late  years,  that 
he  was  quite  astonished  at  my  Lord's  goodness,  etc., 
and  desired  me  to  tell  my  Lord  so :  which  I  did 
this  evening,  and  recommended  him  heartily.  My 
Lord  assured  me  he  esteemed  him  very  much,  and 
would  be  always  kind  to  him:  that  what  he  said 
was  to  make  Congreve  easy,  because  he  knew 
people  talked  as  if  his  Lordship  designed  to  turn 
everybody  out,  and  particularly  Congreve,  which 
indeed  was  true,  for  the  poor  man  told  me  he  appre- 
hended it.  As  I  left  my  Lord  Treasurer  I  called 
on  Congreve  (knowing  where  he  dined)  and  told  him 
what  had  passed  between  my  Lord  and  me:  so  I 
made  a  good  man  easy,  and  that's  a  good  day's 
work." 


^^^^  ^  -—"-^ 


■t 


f'^J?//^. 


TH?:  si(;natures  of  swifts  pkixcipai.  cokrespondexts 


THE   CRISIS  AND   THE  CATASTROPHE  129 

Lord  Munificence  was  the  role  which  he  chose 
for  himself  at  this  time,  and  many  were  the  un- 
solicited testimonials  to  his  performance  of  the  part. 
Dr.  Berkeley,  his  old  schoolfellow,  Pope,  Gay,  Dr. 
King,  Parnell,  Trapp ;  Diaper,  the  poet ;  Tooke,  his 
bookseller;  Barber,  his  printer;  all  were  deeply 
indebted  to  him.  He  wished  to  be  thought  a  patron 
of  letters.  In  our  day  he  would,  no  doubt,  have 
been  known  as  the  prophet  of  culture,  but  happily 
for  the  eighteenth  century,  that  ideal  was  non- 
existent. He  was  chiefly  instrumental  in  founding 
the  Brother's  Club,  originally  called  The  Society,  to 
which  were  admitted  all  the  most  striking  characters 
of  the  time.  Sheridan  thus  describes  its  foundation  : 
"  He"  (Swift)  "was  the  life  and  soul  of  that  famous 
society  of  sixteen,  consisting  of  some  of  the  first  men 
of  the  age,  in  point  of  talents,  rank,  and  virtue. 
To  tie  them  closer  to  each  other,  he  made  them 
adopt  the  endearing  name  of  brothers  :  and  to  spread 
the  circle  still  wider,  the  ladies  of  the  several  members 
were  called  sisters,  and  even  their  children  were 
nephews  and  nieces.  Happy  were  the  envied  few 
who  stood  in  this  adopted  relationship  to  Swift, 
and  they  never  failed  afterwards  boastingly  to  use 
that  title  :  as  may  be  seen  in  several  of  their  letters. 
Great  was  the  canvassing  to  be  admitted  into  that 
number  :  and  the  Duke  of  Ormond  looked  upon  it  as 
a  high  honour  that  he  was  elected  a  member  without 
any  application  on  his  part.  "The  end  of  our  Club  " 
(says  Swift),  "  is  to  advance  conversation  and  friend- 
ship,  and    to   reward    deserving    persons   with   our 


I30  DEAN   SWIFT 

interest  and  recommendation.  We  take  in  none  but 
men  of  wit,  or  men  of  interest :  and  if  we  go  on 
as  we  begin,  no  other  club  of  the  town  will  be  worth 
talking  of."  To  keep  them  steady  to  these  points, 
and  to  prevent  their  degenerating  into  political 
meetings.  Swift  early  opposed  the  admission  of  Lord 
Treasurer,  and  Lord  Keeper,  who  had  been  pro- 
posed, and  they  were  accordingly  excluded :  but 
their  sons  were  received  in  their  room.  There  are 
several  instances  mentioned  of  contributions  raised 
by  them  to  relieve  indigent  merit ;  such  were  dis- 
tributed by  Swift."  No  doubt  the  Society  was  very 
valuable  while  it  lasted,  but  as  all  such  institutions 
will,  it  began  to  suffer  from  the  extravagance  of  its 
members.  Many  were  the  complaints  of  Swift  on 
this  score,  the  meetings  gradually  became  less  fre- 
quent, and  it  was  dissolved  in  the  course  of  a  year 
or  two. 

There  is  a  fallacy  current  among  even  the  en- 
lightened, notified  by  Bacon  in  his  well-known 
saying,  that  he  who  loves  solitude  is  either  a  beast 
or  a  god,  by  which  he  implies  that  the  human  being 
is  a  sociable  animal.  It  is  distinctly  untrue.  Human 
nature  loves  societies,  but  hates  its  kind,  while  it 
makes  into  an  art  the  effort  of  being  sociable.  Thus 
it  was  not  long  before  another  Society  was  started 
by  certain  members  of  the  last,  including  Swift,  Pope, 
Arbuthnot,  Gay,  and  Parnell.  They  called  them- 
selves the  Scriblerus  Club,  and  issued  various 
writings  as  the  memoirs  of  Master  Scriblerus,  a 
supposed   member   of   the   Society.      Its    ostensible 


THE  CRISIS  AND   THE   CATASTROPHE  131 

aim  was  literary.  The  design  of  its  members  was 
"  to  have  ridiculed  all  the  false  tastes  in  learning, 
under  the  character  of  a  man  of  capacity  enough, 
that  had  dipped  into  every  art  and  science,  but  in- 
judiciously in  each."  Like  its  predecessor,  however, 
this  Club  was  short-lived,  and  was  dispersed  the 
same  year.  Its  decease  perhaps  signalized  the  end 
of  Swift's  life  as  the  centre  of  political  activity. 
The  year  17 14  saw  his  retirement  from  public  life, 
his  fall  from  the  high  estate  in  which,  for  so  long 
now,  he  had  been  established.  Some  account  of  its 
principal  members  may  not  be  unfitting  here.  Pope 
and  Arbuthnot  were  among  those  friends  of  Swift 
who  clung  to  him  to  the  last.  Both  have  left  in 
writing  strong  testimonials  to  his  capacity  for 
friendship.  Surely  no  man  ever  had  so  wide  or  so 
deep  a  power  of  grappling  friends  to  his  soul. 
Arbuthnot  wrote  to  him  some  years  later :  "  Dear 
Friend,  the  last  sentence  of  your  letter  plunged  a 
dagger  in  my  heart.  Never  repeat  those  sad  but 
tender  words,  that  you  will  try  to  forget  me.  For 
my  part  I  can  never  forget  you — at  least  till  1 
discover,  which  is  impossible,  another  friend  whose 
conversation  could  procure  me  the  pleasure  I  have 
found  in  yours." 

Pope  could  write  of  him  after  an  intimate  friend- 
ship of  some  twenty  years'  standing  :  "  My  sincere 
love  of  that  valuable,  indeed  incomparable,  man  will 
accompany  him  through  life,  and  pursue  his  memory 
were  I  to  live  a  hundred  lives,  as  many  of  his  works 
will   live,  which  are  absolutely  original,  unequalled, 


132  DEAN   SWIFT 

unexampled.  His  humanity,  his  charity,  his  con- 
descension, his  candour,  are  equal  to  his  wit,  and 
require  as  good  and  true  a  taste  to  be  equally 
valued." 

At  the  end  of  the  year  171 3  all  eyes  must  have 
been  upon  Swift.  The  minds  of  all  his  friends  must 
have  been  concerned  with  one  topic  :  what  was  to  be 
his  reward  for  all  his  labours?  Swift  himself  had 
hopes  of  some  literary  post.  Throughout  his  political 
career  he  had  identified  himself  thoroughly  with  men 
of  letters,  and  he  wished  now  to  obtain  a  triumphant 
exit  crowned  with  literary  laurels.  The  submission 
which  he  demanded  from  his  social  superiors  might 
frequently  be  interpreted  as  a  wish  to  exact  deference 
towards  the  profession  of  letters  which  was  only  too 
likely  to  meet  with  universal  contempt.  One  of  his 
ambitions  was  to  found  an  English  academy,  partly, 
no  doubt,  to  put  letters  on  a  better  footing.  In  con- 
nection with  this  design  he  had  written  in  171 2  a 
paper  entitled  "a  proposal  for  correcting,  improving, 
and  ascertaining  the  English  language."  The  project, 
however,  had  been  swept  into  oblivion  by  the  political 
whirlwind.  He  recurred  to  this  ambition  when  he 
applied  for  the  post  of  historiographer.  He  had 
already  written  the  "  History  of  the  Last  Four  Years 
of  Queen  Anne,"  which  is  distinctly  disappointing,  for 
it  lacks  the  personal  touch  which  always  gives  vigour 
to  Swift's  political  writings.  His  application  was,  how- 
ever, too  late  to  be  considered.  Many  reasons  have 
been  given  for  his  failure  to  obtain  preferment,  among 
them    Lord    Orrery's    charitable    one,    that    Swift's 


THE  CRISIS  AND  THE   CATASTROPHE  133 

English  friends  preferred  to  keep  him  in  Ireland  by 
granting  him  some  comparatively  insignificant  pre- 
ferment rather  than  to  allow  him  to  remain  in  England 
where  he  was  a  perpetual  danger.  Other  writers, 
with  perhaps  an  equal  lack  of  discernment,  have 
described  Swift  as  the  dupe  of  the  ministry,  and  have 
given  as  the  reason  for  his  works  achieving  no  result, 
that  the  Tory  leaders  had  now  done  with  him  and 
were  ready  to  cast  him  off  as  a  useless  instrument. 
No  one  with  real  knowledge  of  Swift's  character 
could  believe  this  statement. 

Perhaps  the  only  reason  which  can  have  weight 
attached  to  it  is  that  afforded  by  the  Queen's  dislike 
of  Swift.  Her  hostility,  roused  by  the  "Tale  of  a 
Tub,"  was  further  fostered  by  the  insinuations  of  the 
Duchess  of  Somerset,  who,  naturally,  never  forgave 
Swift  the  "  Windsor  Prophecy."  It  was  impossible  for 
the  Queen  to  reconcile  her  conscience  to  bestowing 
any  high  ecclesiastical  position  on  a  man  who  had  a 
reputation  for  being  unorthodox.  Thus  Swift  was 
passed  over  first  for  the  Bishopric  of  Waterford,  and 
throughout  Anne's  reign  for  one  post  after  another, 
until  he  was  finally  rejected  for  the  Bishopric  of 
Down  in  favour  of  Sterne.  But  he  did  not  aspire  to 
an  Irish  bishopric.  The  reason  is  not  difficult  to 
seek.  Ireland  meant  exile  to  all  Englishmen.  Swift 
looked  upon  the  fact  of  his  birth  in  Ireland  as  a  dis- 
grace. There  was  against  Ireland  a  prejudice  of  long 
standing.  It  finds  expression  in  the  writings  of 
Temple,  who  speaks  as  a  member  of  the  ruling  class. 
The  Irish  themselves  were  looked  upon  as  responsible 


134  DEAN   SWIFT 

for  their  own  misery  and  poverty.  Temple  thus 
describes  it :  "  Ireland,  where  by  the  largeness  and 
plenty  of  the  food,  and  scarcitj^  of  people,  all  things 
necessary  to  life  are  so  cheap,  that  an  industrious 
man,  by  two  days'  labour,  may  gain  enough  to  feed 
him  the  rest  of  the  week  :  which  I  take  to  be  a  very 
plain  ground  of  the  laziness  attributed  to  the  people  : 
for  men  naturally  prefer  ease  before  labour,  and  will 
not  take  pains,  if  they  can  live  idle  :  though,  when  by 
necessity  they  have  been  inured  to  it,  they  cannot 
leave  it,  being  grown  a  custom  necessary  to  their 
health  and  to  their  very  entertainment."  This  was 
the  state  of  affairs  in  1699,  but  in  171 3,  through  their 
indolence  resulting  from  prosperity,  the  Irish  had 
become  hopelessly  poverty-stricken,  and  Ireland  was 
looked  on  as  a  land  of  barbarians  and  as  a  country  in 
which  Englishmen  could  not  live  consistently  with 
their  dignity  as  Englishmen. 

What  a  great  thing  is  an  Englishman's  dignity ! 
Swift,  ever  since  the  days  of  his  residence  with  the 
Temples,  had  shared  this  prejudice  and  had  looked 
back  with  bitter  regret  to  his  school-days  and  college 
life.  The  prejudice  had,  no  doubt,  increased  since 
then,  for  Swift  was  not  the  sort  of  man  to  alter  an 
opinion  which  was  once  firmly  fixed.  He  refused  to 
lay  claim  to  Ireland  as  his  birthplace.  He  "  was 
dropped  in  Ireland,"  as  he  ungracefully  termed  it ; 
but,  he  no  doubt  added,  it  was  against  his  wishes. 
England  was  the  country  of  his  adoption,  and 
throughout  his  political  life  he  looked  for  English 
preferment.      He  was   promised   more   than   once    a 


THE  CRISIS  AND  THE  CATASTROPHE  135 

prebend  of  Windsor,  but,  happily  for  himself,  he  put 
no  trust  in  the  promise.  At  the  end  of  the  year  17 12 
he  began  to  grow  impatient  of  the  recurrence  of 
empty  promises  on  the  part  of  the  ministry.  They 
had  indeed  "left  him  Jonathan  as  they  found  him." 
For  the  first  time  since  his  life  as  Secretary  he 
determined  to  push  forward  his  own  cause,  and  to 
insist  on  preferment.  He  refused,  therefore,  to  lend 
his  services  to  the  Tory  leaders  any  longer  unless 
they  made  some  definite  move  to  secure  promotion 
for  him.  When  once  they  saw  that  he  was  determined 
they  advocated  his  cause,  and  when  the  deanery  of 
St.  Patrick's  fell  vacant  they  offered  it  to  Swift. 
Preferment  in  Ireland,  involving  residence  in  the 
country  which  he  most  hated,  was  to  be  Swift's 
reward  for  all  his  work.  May  he  not  be  allowed 
some  expression  of  resentment  ?  He  was  now  forty- 
six,  and  after  fifteen  years  of  untiring  service  to  his 
country  he  was  to  end  his  days  thus.  As  years  were 
considered  then,  he  was  an  old  man.  Premature  old 
age  is  the  inevitable  consequence  of  an  intemperate 
generation,  and  in  the  eighteenth  century  men  were 
old  at  forty,  decrepit  at  fifty.  Swift,  whose  life  had 
always  been  most  temperate  in  spite  of  the  complaint 
from  which  he  had  suffered  so  many  years,  was  con- 
sidered extremely  robust  because  he  was  still  capable 
of  conducting  political  warfare.  It  must  always  be 
borne  in  mind  by  those  who  consider  his  last  years, 
that  when  he  had  reached  the  age  of  seventy-two  or 
three  he  was  looked  on  with  the  same  compassion 
as  we  look  on  our  old  men  of  ninety.     The  old  age 


136  DEAN   SWIFT 

which  men  had  to  live  through  after  seventy  was  that 
of  the  Struldbrugs,  whom  their  creator  had  repre- 
sented with  the  most  loathsome  characteristics. 

All  these  elements  must  be  taken  into  considera- 
tion when  we,  standing  beside  Swift,  look  down  at 
the  prospect  before  him.  There  was  only  one 
alleviation — that  he  was  returning  to  Stella  whom  he 
had  looked  forward  to  seeing  for  three  years.  It  was 
not  to  her,  however,  that  he  expressed  his  disappoint- 
ment. The  heaviness  which  lay  on  his  spirits  is  to 
be  read  between  the  lines  of  the  journal.  The  definite 
expression  of  his  misery  is  to  be  found  in  letters  to 
Miss  Vanhomrigh.  "  At  my  first  coming  I  thought  I 
should  have  died  with  discontent,  and  was  horribly 
melancholy  while  they  were  installing  me  :  but  it 
began  to  wear  off,  and  change  to  dulness."  There  is 
something  heart-breaking  in  this  confession  of  dulness 
after  a  life  of  never-ending  business  and  ceaseless  toil 
which  at  the  same  time  formed  his  enjoyment.  There 
is  no  more  unhappy  word  than  "  dull  "  in  the  English 
language.  Dulness  and  boredom  are  two  of  the 
devil's  snares  especially  meant  to  entrap  the  pious 
who  scorn  enjoyment. 

He  had  looked  forward  to  a  perpetual  existence 
on  a  great  stage  surrounded  by  big  issues,  while  he 
himself  was  to  be  the  promoter  of  mighty  schemes 
with  wide  and  far-reaching  results.  A  kingdom  was 
the  toy  with  which  he  would  play,  the  greatest  in 
that  kingdom  the  ninepins  which  he  would  raise  or 
overthrow  at  his  pleasure.  What  did  he  see  instead 
of  this?     A  hopeless  existence  in  a  dirty  depressing 


THE   CRISIS   AND  THE   CATASTROPHE  137 

town  surrounded  by  poverty  and  distress.  He  saw 
himself  surrounded  by  a  people  whom  he  looked 
down  on  as  his  inferiors.  He  would  be  cut  off  from 
all  those  whose  interests  were  his  own,  far  away 
from  the  party  which  he  had  helped  so  greatly  to 
build  up.  He  saw  himself  sinking  into  nothingness, 
forgotten  by  the  country  which  had  once  rung  with 
his  name  Perhaps  another  would  rise  and  take 
his  place  while  he  ate  his  heart  out  in  vain  longings. 
He  would  rust  away  in  enforced  idleness  while  the 
political  world  had  need  of  him.  This  was  to  be  the 
end  of  it.  The  great  Swift,  leader  of  men,  who  could 
influence  nations  for  peace  or  war,  was  to  enter  on  a 
long  rest  to  which  death  was  preferable.  A  prepara- 
tion of  thirty  years,  activity  of  twenty,  and  then  a 
relapse  to  the  chrysalis,  to  wait  for  the  decay  of  old 
age.     This  was  the  future  which  he  foresaw. 

There  was  one  piece  of  work  required  of  him  yet. 
The  duumvirate  of  Harley  and  St.  John  had  always 
threatened  to  collapse  owing  to  the  incompatibility 
of  temperament  of  the  two  men.  Harmony  just  now 
was  of  vital  importance.  The  days  of  peace,  how- 
ever, were  over.  These  two  men  were  only  another 
instance  of  the  danger  of  prosperity.  In  accomplish- 
ing peace  they  had  achieved  what  they  had  been 
summoned  to  do ;  but  they  had  achieved  it  at  an 
enormous  risk  to  themselves.  An  unreasoning  people 
had  complained  because  of  the  weight  of  taxation  and 
the  accumulation  of  wealth  by  an  unscrupulous 
general.  An  unreasoning  people  now  complained 
because   of  the   cessation   of  striking  victories   and 


138  DEAN  SWIFT 

great  prizes.  The  peace,  moreover,  while  it  had 
made  England  the  first  Power  of  Europe,  had  failed 
in  its  object.  Philip  still  retained  the  Crown  of  Spain 
and  the  Catalonians  were  left  unprotected.  The 
merchant  classes  were,  moreover,  dissatisfied  with 
the  trade  clauses  of  the  Peace ;  the  religious  en- 
thusiasm following  on  Sacheverell's  impeachment 
had  subsided.  The  question  now  remaining  was 
that  of  the  succession  to  the  English  throne,  and 
from  this  side  came  the  great  danger  to  the  Govern- 
ment. 

The  uncertainty  of  the  Queen's  health,  and  the 
grave  rumours  of  the  intrigues  of  the  leaders  of  the 
ministry  with  the  Pretender  added  to  the  precarious- 
ness  of  the  Tory  position.  Both  leaders  were 
unpopular  with  different  classes.  Lastly  the  Govern- 
ment was  a  house  divided  against  itself,  hence  its 
downfall  was  only  a  matter  of  time.  Swift  came 
to  England  and  effected  a  temporary  reconciliation. 
Immediately  after  his  return  to  Ireland,  however, 
Oxford  and  Bolingbroke  again  quarrelled.  A  second 
visit  to  England  had  no  result,  and  he  returned  to 
his  Deanery  to  write  a  remonstrance  to  the  leaders. 
In  the  meantime  came  the  news  of  Oxford's  downfall 
and  Bolingbroke's  promotion  to  the  chief  place  in  the 
ministry.  At  the  same  time  there  came  an  offer  of 
;^iooo  to  pay  the  expenses  of  Swift's  induction  on 
condition  that  he  would  continue  to  support  the 
Government.  Once  more  he  had  the  opportunity  of 
a  place  in  the  middle  of  political  activity.  But  now, 
as  on  some  other  occasions,  affection  got  the  better 


THE   CRISIS  AND   THE   CATASTROPHE  139 

of  reason,  and  a  heart-broken  letter  from  Oxford 
induced  Swift  to  give  up  his  last  chance  and  follow 
his  friend  into  retirement.  Bolingbroke's  triumph, 
however,  was  short-lived.  The  Queen  was  dead  in 
four  days  after  his  victory,  and  he  had  to  fly  the 
country,  while  Oxford  was  imprisoned. 

Walpole  the  financier  was  pre-eminent.  Swift 
was  heartbroken,  but  still  tried  to  keep  up  his  spirits, 
offering  to  accompany  Oxford  to  prison.  It  is  not 
difficult  to  imagine  what  a  terrible  effect  the  downfall 
of  his  friends  would  have  on  him.  His  health  had 
not  been  good  for  some  time,  and  this  last  shock  had 
a  very  bad  effect  on  a  highly  nervous  temperament. 
He  was  also  troubled  at  this  time  by  the  affair  with 
Miss  Vanhomrigh.  Thus  his  first  years  in  his  new 
position  were  extremely  troublous  ones.  It  required 
the  fortitude  of  a  moral  Samson  to  undergo  the 
anxieties  and  trouble  which  befel  Swift  at  this  time. 
Needless  to  say  he  came  out  of  it  triumphant,  and 
the  years  in  Ireland  to  which  he  had  looked  forward 
with  so  much  dread  were  fraught  with  greater  fame 
and  happiness  than  any  one  could  possibly  have 
foreseen. 


CHAPTER  V 
DON   QUIXOTE 

SWIFT  as  the  courtier  and  chivalrous  knight  is  a 
subject  over  which  we  may  linger  pleasantly, 
perhaps  as  in  a  rose-garden  in  summer  after 
the  cold  blasts  and  rugged  storms  of  winter.  Yet 
this  was  no  courtier  of  mincing  phrases,  and  per- 
fumed elegance,  no  purveyor  in  unmeaning  flatteries, 
or  obsequious  insincerities.  We  will  not  insult  him 
by  calling  him  a  sincere  friend,  the  modern  signifi- 
cance of  the  phrase  is  too  full  of  obloquy,  but  suffice 
it  to  say  that  he  was  a  true  friend  to  both  men  and 
women.  Yet  he  was  not  a  "woman's  man."  With 
the  exception  of  Stella,  his  greatest  friends  were 
among  men,  and  he  numbered  among  these  some  of 
the  great  ones  of  the  eighteenth  century.  His 
friends  were  among  the  writers  and  politicians  of 
the  age  (if  one  may  be  pardoned  for  using,  as  a 
matter  of  convenience,  the  futile  but  popular  dis- 
tinction), among  the  practical  and  active,  rather  than 
among  the  thinkers  and  leaders  of  speculative 
thought.  Thus  his  circle  consisted  first  of  Somers, 
Congreve,  Addison  and  Steele;  it  varied  then  to 
Bolingbroke,  Oxford,  Prior,  Arbuthnot,  Gay,  and 
in  later  years  we  see  him  surrounded  in  Ireland  by  a 

140 


DON   QUIXOTE  141 

small    circle    of   congenial   spirits,   including    Pope, 
Sheridan  and  others.   The  course  of  these  friendships 
is  described  each  in  its  chronological  sequence,  but 
perhaps   Swift's   general   characteristics   as   a  friend 
may  be  discussed  here.     Sincerity,  truthfulness  and 
unselfishness  were  his  in  a  remarkable  degree.     His 
allegiance,    once    given,    was    unaltered.      Addison 
speaks   of  him   as   "the   most   agreeable  companion 
and  the  truest  friend  of  his  age."    Many  must  be  the 
shocks  to  his  belief  in  those  whom  he  had  "grappled 
to  his  soul  "  before  he  would  give  them  up,  and  even 
then  he   maintained   an   affection  for   them  and  was 
ready    to     help     them     when     opportunity     offered. 
Among  them  may  have  been  numbered  those  who, 
seeing  the  singleness  of  mind,  almost  simplicity,  of 
the  man  in  this  respect,  were  willing  and  ready  to 
take  advantage  of  him — it  must  invariably  happen  so 
in  the  case  of  such  a  character — but  if  there  were 
traitors  among  his  friends,  surely  Swift's  lack  of  per- 
ception in  not  recognizing  them  is  no  detriment  to  his 
character.     In    him   simplicity  and   astuteness  were 
combined  to  an  extraordinary  degree,  the  guileless- 
ness  of  the  child  with  the  mature  judgment  of  the 
experienced  man  of  the  world.     Affection  could  thus 
lead   his   reason   astray,   and  yet  he  was   no   senti- 
mentalist nor  given  to  yield  to  his  emotions.    He  was 
not    proof    against    impulse,    generosity    frequently 
prompted  him  to  a  suddenness  of  action  which  was 
unusual  in  a  man  of  such  rare  sanity  and  concentra- 
tion of  purpose. 

Another  element  tended  to  make  him  a  difficult 


142  DEAN   SWIFT 

member  of  society.  The  lack  of  that  indefinable 
virtue,  "good  breeding,"  which  no  amount  of  social 
intercourse  could  teach  him,  for  it  depends  perhaps 
on  the  power  of  merging  one's  own  individuality 
in  society  in  the  interest  of  others,  also  led  him 
into  errors  of  impulse.  The  spirit  which  prompted 
him  to  demand  subscriptions  for  the  works  of  poor 
poets  and  to  insist  on  getting  them,  regardless  of  his 
surroundings,  points  to  a  mixture  of  generosity  and 
determination  to  achieve  his  purpose  at  any  cost. 
His  ostentatious  and  undue  familiarity  with  the 
great,  his  love  of  displaying  his  power  with  his 
social  superiors,  his  independent  rejection  of  an}' 
sort  of  patronage,  while  they  point  to  strength  of 
character,  also  reveal  an  innate  boorishness  which 
no  ameliorating  influence  could  soften.  Yet,  though 
underneath  there  lay  the  sterling  worth  and  forget- 
fulness  of  self  which  were  pre-eminently  his,  we 
cannot  overlook  this  fault  on  which  perhaps  he 
prided  himself.  Much  more  harm  is  done  and  greater 
injury  inflicted  by  tasteless  rudeness  and  ill-judged 
criticism  than  by  courteous  insincerities.  Though 
this  defect  in  Swift  was  treated  as  a  humorous 
quality  by  the  society  in  which  he  moved,  it 
accounted  probably  for  the  repeated  omissions  of 
his  name  in  the  list  of  preferments,  for  many  must 
have  been  the  occasions  when  friend  and  foe  alike, 
smarting  under  his  caustic  sarcasms,  vowed  venge- 
ance to  be  taken  sooner  or  later.  Partly,  perhaps, 
his  love  of  power  prevented  him  from  recognizing 
the  harm  which  he  did  to  his  own  cause,  but  more 


DON   QUIXOTE  143 

probably  his  complete  obliviousness  to  criticism 
made  him,  at  all  costs,  carry  out  his  policy  of  ill- 
judged  sincerity.  There  is  nothing  so  invidious  as 
the  defect  of  a  virtue,  nothing  so  dangerous  as  an 
excess  of  goodness.  Intemperance  of  character  and 
a  consequent  dissipation  invariably  follow^,  though 
this  is  a  fact  little  recognized. 

The  story  of  the  Countess  of  Burlington  is  typical 
of  Swift's  bearing  in  society.     "  Dining  one  day  with 
the   Earl    of    Burlington   soon    after   his    Lordship's 
marriage,  that   nobleman,  expecting   some   diversion 
from      Swift's     oddities     of     behaviour,     purposely 
neglected  to  name  him  to  his  lady,  who  was  entirely 
ignorant  of  the  Dean's  person.     The  Dean  generally 
wore   his  gowns   till   they  were   quite   rusty,  which 
being  then  the  case,  she  supposed  him  to  be  some 
clergyman  of  no   great  consequence.     After   dinner, 
the   Dean    said    to    her,    '  Lady   Burlington,   I   hear 
you   can  sing ;  come   give   me   a  song.'     The   lady, 
disgusted   with   this   unceremonious   way  of  asking 
such    a    favour,    positively    refused    him.     He    said 
she   should   sing,  or  he  would    make   her.      '  What, 
madam,  I  suppose  you  take  me  for  one  of  your  poor 
paltry  English  hedge-parsons ;  sing  when  I  bid  you ! ' 
As  the  Earl  did  nothing  but  laugh  at  this  freedom, 
the  lady  was  so  vexed,  that  she  burst  into  tears  and 
retired.     His   first   compliment  when   he   saw  her  a 
little  time  afterwards  was  '  Pray,  madam,  are  you  as 
ill-natured   as  when  I  saw  you  last  ? '   to  which  she 
replied   with    the   greatest    good-humour,   '  No,   Mr. 
Dean,  I  will  sing  for  you  now,  if  you  please.'" 


144  DEAN   SWIFT 

Though  political  advancement  was  not  to  be  his 
as  the  result  of  political  friendships,  yet  he  acted  as 
agent  again  and  again  in  the  promotion  of  others. 
He  came  gradually  to  be  looked  upon  as  the  mediator 
between  those  who  had  the  power  and  those  who 
wanted  it,  and  all  regarded  him  as  the  man  whose 
good  word  was  necessary  before  peace  could  be 
secured.  Thus  in  a  short  time  "he  served  fifty  better 
than  Sir  William  Temple  had  served  him,  and  not 
relations  either,"  he  wrote  to  a  friend.  No  object 
was  too  tiresome  or  too  tedious  for  him  if  through 
his  own  effort  he  could  promote  or  help  the  really 
deserving.  Writers  were  perhaps  the  special  object 
of  his  benevolence.  Congreve,  Gay,  Steele,  Pope, 
all  had  to  thank  him  for  timely  help,  in  some  cases 
for  office,  in  others  for  help  in  publishing  their 
literary  works.  As  for  himself,  he  received  a  financial 
result  from  only  one  of  his  books,  "Gulliver's 
Travels,"  and  this  was  achieved  purely  through 
Pope's  practical  assistance.  A  letter  of  distress  from 
one  of  his  literary  friends  received  an  immediate 
and  generous  answer.  Sheridan  says  of  him  :  "His 
constancy  in  friendship  was  such  that  he  was  never 
known  to  break  any  connexion  of  that  sort  till  his 
faculties  were  impaired  in  the  decline  of  life,  except 
in  the  case  of  Steele,  when  he  was  perfectly  justified 
from  the  ingratitude  and  insolence  of  his  behaviour 
towards  him."  Indeed  his  notions  of  friendship  were 
so  exalted  that  he  wished  it  might  not  be  confined  to 
the  present  life ;  for  he  says  in  one  of  his  letters  to 
Pope,  "  I  have  often  wished  that  God  Almighty  would 


DON   QUIXOTE  145 

be  so  easy  to  the  weakness  of  mankind  as  to  let  old 
friends  be  acquainted  in  another  state,  and  if  I  were 
to  write  Utopia  for  Heaven  that  would  be  one  of  my 
schemes." 

Such  was  the  warmth  of  his  affection  towards  all 
those  to  whom  he  gave  the  name  of  friend.  His 
friendship  for  Harley,  however,  was  stronger  and 
warmer  than  any  of  the  others.  The  bond  of 
brotherhood  lightly  established  in  the  "  Brother's 
Club  "  deepened  and  strengthened  into  the  warmest 
friendship.  The  attempted  assassination  of  Harley 
during  the  early  years  of  their  friendship  reduced 
Swift  to  despair.  "  O  dear  M.  D.,  my  heart  is  almost 
broken,  you  will  hear  the  thing  before  this  comes 
to  you,"  he  writes  to  Stella  immediately  after  the 
attempt.  "  I  am  in  mortal  pain  for  him  .  .  .  Pray 
pardon  my  distraction.  I  now  think  of  all  his  kindness 
to  me.  The  poor  creature  now  lies  stabbed  in  his  bed 
by  a  desperate  French  Popish  villain.  Good-night, 
and  God  preserve  you  both,  and  pity  me  ;  I  want  it." 

This  friendship  suffered  no  decline  throughout 
the  years  of  their  work  together  in  spite  of  Harley's 
slowness  to  secure  promotion  for  Swift.  So  strongly 
indeed  did  Swift  feel  the  ties  of  affection  that  when, 
after  Harley's  downfall,  there  was  some  prospect  of 
advancement  for  Swift  he  refused  to  entertain  the 
thought  of  it,  and  preferred  to  retire  with  his  friend 
into  the  country.  Perhaps  a  letter  written  by  him  to 
Harley  in  17 14  throws  strong  light  on  the  friendship 
between  the  two  men.  It  is  worth  quoting  almost  at 
full  length  : — 
I. 


146  DEAN   SWIFT 

"My  Lord, 

"When  I  was  with  you,  I  have  said  more 
than  once,  that  I  would  never  allow  quality  or  station 
made  any  real  difference  between  men.  Being  now 
absent  and  forgotten,  I  have  changed  my  mind  :  you 
have  a  thousand  people  who  can  pretend  they  love 
you,  with  as  much  appearance  of  sincerity  as  I ;  so 
that,  according  to  common  justice,  I  can  have  but  a 
thousandth  part  in  return  of  what  I  give,  and  this 
difference  is  wholly  owing  to  your  station.  And  this 
misfortune  is  still  the  greater,  because  I  always  loved 
you  just  so  much  the  worse  for  your  station ;  for,  in 
your  public  capacity  you  have  often  angered  me  to 
the  heart,  but,  as  a  private  man,  never  once.  So 
that,  if  I  only  look  toward  myself,  I  could  wish  you  a 
private  man  to-morrow :  for  I  have  nothing  to  ask,  at 
least  nothing  that  you  will  give,  which  is  the  same 
thing  :  and  then  you  would  see  whether  I  should  not 
with  much  more  willingness  attend  you  in  retire- 
ment, whenever  you  please  to  give  me  leave,  than 
ever  I  did  at  London  or  Windsor.  From  these 
sentiments  I  will  never  write  to  you,  if  I  can  help  it, 
otherwise  than  as  a  private  person,  or  allow  myself 
to  have  been  obliged  to  you  in  any  other  capacity. 
The  memory  of  one  great  instance  of  your  candour 
and  justice  I  will  carry  to  my  grave,  that  having  been 
in  a  manner  domestic  with  you  for  almost  four  years, 
it  was  never  in  the  power  of  any  public  or  concealed 
enemy  to  make  you  think  ill  of  me,  though  malice 
and  envy  were  often  employed  to  that  end.  If  I  live 
posterity  shall  know  that  and  more,  which,  though 


DON   QUIXOTE  147 

you  and  somebody  that  shall  be  nameless  seem  to 
value  less  than  I  could  wish,  is  all  the  return  that  I 
can  make  you.  Will  you  give  me  leave  to  say  how 
I  would  desire  to  stand  in  your  memory?  As  one, 
who  was  truly  sensible  of  the  honour  you  did  him, 
though  he  was  too  proud  to  be  vain  upon  it,  as  one 
who  was  neither  assuming,  officious,  nor  teasing : 
who  never  wilfully  misrepresented  persons  or  facts 
to  you,  nor  consulted  his  passions  when  he  gave  a 
character ;  and,  lastly,  as  one,  whose  indiscretions 
proceeded  from  a  weak  head  and  not  an  ill  heart.  1 
will  add  one  thing  more,  which  is  the  highest  com- 
pliment I  can  make,  that  I  never  was  afraid  of 
offending  you,  nor  am  now  in  any  pain  for  the 
manner  I  write  to  you  in.  I  have  said  enough :  and, 
like  one  of  your  levie,  having  made  my  bow,  I  shrink 
back  into  the  crowd." 

This  letter,  perhaps,  suffices  to  ameliorate  the 
severity  of  the  criticism  which  we  are  compelled  to 
make  on  Swift's  general  treatment  of  his  social 
superiors.  It  is  the  expression  of  deep,  strong 
affection  from  the  heart  of  a  man  who  was  little 
wont  to  give  voice  to  his  emotions,  and  preferred 
rather  to  pass  before  the  world  as  one  having  none  of 
these  things.  It  is  the  voice  of  the  man  so  little 
recognized  in  the  Swift  of  history,  whose  days  could 
be  darkened  with  gloom  by  a  sad  story  and  who, 
when  Stella  lay  dying,  could  not  bear  to  witness  her 
last  moments,  and  on  the  night  of  her  funeral  had  to 
have  another  room  than  the  one  from  which  he  could 
see  the  lights  of  the  church. 


148  DEAN   SWIFT 

It  was  not,  however,  only  the  loss  of  his  greatest 
friends  which  could  fill  him  with  sorrow.  Again  and 
again  it  happened  that  the  death  of  a  friend  outside 
his  inmost  circle,  perhaps  a  mere  acquaintance,  over- 
shadowed him  completely  for  days.  His  was  a  mind 
almost  too  sensitive  to  grief,  responding  too  easily, 
perhaps,  to  the  sorrow  of  others ;  it  is  pre-eminently 
the  defect  of  the  ultra-human  disposition,  for  it  in- 
volves too  great  a  strain  on  the  temperament.  The 
unexpected  death  of  young  Harrison,  for  whom  he 
had  obtained  some  Government  post,  threw  him  into 
despair.  "Think  what  grief  this  is  to  me!  I  could 
not  dine  with  Lord  Treasurer,  nor  anywhere  else  : 
but  got  a  bit  of  meal  towards  evening.  No  loss  ever 
grieved  me  so  much  ;  poor  creature  ! "  The  death  of 
Lady  Ashburnham,  daughter  of  the  Duke  of  Ormond, 
wrings  from  him  a  heartbroken  exclamation.  "  I  hate 
life  when  I  think  it  exposed  to  such  accidents :  and 
to  see  so  many  thousand  wretches  burdening  the 
earth  while  such  as  her  die,  makes  me  think  God  did 
never  intend  life  for  a  blessing." 

Any  misfortunes  to  his  numerous  proteges  were 
considered  in  the  light  of  personal  troubles.  The 
financial  difficulties  of  Mrs.  Anne  Long,  who  is 
frequently  mentioned  in  the  Journal,  caused  him 
much  anxiety,  and  her  death  later  was  a  blow  to 
him.  Lord  Orrery,  with  a  view  to  his  discredit, 
talks  of  his  various  mistresses,  meaning  to  cast  a 
slur  on  Swift's  precarious  charities,  for  many  were 
the  old  dames  whom  he  took  under  his  protection 
and    he    would    establish    one    with    an    apple-stall, 


DON   QUIXOTE  149 

another  with  a  pedlar's  basket,  refusing  to  pauperize 
them.       He    must    have   received   many   a   blessing 
from  them.     His  charity,  moreover,  began  at  home, 
for   many   were    the    occasions    on    which   the    lazy 
rogue,  Patrick,  his  manservant,  was  forgiven.     The 
domestic  picture   of    the   great   politician,   with   the 
world  at  his  feet  and  society  listening  open-mouthed 
to   every   word   he    uttered,    coming    home    to    two 
rooms,   badly   lighted   and    badly   heated,   to    be    at 
the   mercy   of    this   drunken  dependant,    contains  a 
humorous  as  well  as   a  pathetic   element.      Stella's 
tears    must    sometimes    have    been    mingled    with 
laughter   at    the   quaint   descriptions   to    which    she 
was  treated  ;  the  great  Swift  coming  home  to  find  his 
rooms  newly  washed  at  ten  o'clock  in  the  evening, 
so  that  he   must  perforce  go  to   bed  sneezing  and 
wake   in    the    morning   with   a  violent   cold :    Swift 
the  ascetic  reduced  to  greater  depths  of  asceticism 
than   ever   he   could   wish   for,  by  having  to   retire 
supperless    to    bed    owing    to  the    vagaries   of   his 
servant :   the  irate  master  swearing  to  dismiss  the 
"blackhearted  scoundrel"   when  he  presented   him- 
self in  a  drunken  condition,  and  forgiving  him  once 
more  half  an  hour  afterwards  :   the  economist  who 
haggled  over  the  price  of   a  wig,  being   presented 
with  a   bill   for  gold   lace   for   his  servant's  livery, 
and    after    an    hour's     storming    good-humouredly 
yielding,    to    the    rogue's     satisfaction;    the    bitter 
misanthropist   finding  a  lame  bird  in  his  servant's 
room,  and  tending  it  and  restoring  it  to  health.     He 
had  also  a  system  of  lending  to  poor  working  men 


I50  DEAN   SWIFT 

small  sums  of  money  at  low  interest  in  order  that 
they  might  either  establish  themselves  in  business 
or  perhaps  free  themselves  from  some  special  diffi- 
culty. This  system,  however,  which  he  proposed 
to  carry  on  strictly  commercial  lines,  did  not  answer, 
for  his  debtors  were  frequently  unwilling  to  pay, 
and  the  onus  of  merciless  usurer  fell  on  Swift's 
shoulders,  while  his  whole  object  was  to  help.  He, 
therefore,  had  to  give  up  this  form  of  benevolence. 
He  never  learnt  the  lesson  which  humanity  has  to 
teach,  that  altruism  per  se  is  an  error  in  judgment; 
that  the  world  will  not  be  governed  by  reason  and 
common-sense  so  long  as  the  spirit  of  love  is  with- 
held. Human  nature,  while  it  welcomes  love,  resists 
management.  Swift,  who,  in  his  social  ideas,  had 
to  stand  alone  in  the  eighteenth  century,  would 
have  been  heartily  welcomed  in  the  twentieth 
among  a  number  of  workers  of  a  similar  turn  of 
thought.  He  was  in  advance  of  his  age  in  this  as 
in  his  attitude  to  women  and  his  conception  of 
their  position  in  society.  His  ideal  of  the  womanly 
character  was  equally  high.  He  exacted  chiefly 
from  them  purity  of  soul  and  idea.  His  refusal  to 
allow  any  coarse  element  to  intrude  in  the  presence 
of  women  has  been  mentioned  in  another  connec- 
tion. He  satirized  in  "  polite  conversation,"  the 
unfortunate  but  popular  custom  of  introducing 
innuendo  into  everyday  conversation.  If  any  of  his 
women  friends  departed  from  this  ideal  he  was 
much  shocked.  "I  had  a  letter  from  Mrs.  Long 
that    has    quite    turned    my    stomach    against    her : 


DON    QUIXOTE  151 

no  less  than  two  nasty  jests  in  it,  with  dashes  to 
suppose  them."  Probably  this  error  materially 
affected  Swift's  opinion  of  her,  though  hitherto  it 
had  been  a  high  one,  compounded  of  sympathy 
with  her  misfortunes  and  respect  for  her  courage 
under  difficulties. 

In  his  treatment  of  women  he  recognized  one 
factor  in  them  which  hitherto  had  been  overlooked, 
partly,  perhaps,  because  of  the  defects  in  a  woman's 
training  in  the  past ;  this  one  factor  which  he 
urged  again  and  again  was  their  capacity  for  com- 
panionship to  men,  and  his  whole  life  was  a  stand- 
ing illustration  of  this  opinion,  and  in  this  he 
belonged  to  our  own  century. 

In  Swift's  friendship  with  Stella,  perhaps,  we 
find  the  chief  reason  for  that  world-wide  fame  which 
he  has  attained.  The  history  of  this  friendship  is 
the  history  of  a  man's  need  of  companionship,  of  a 
woman's  response  to  that  need,  nothing  more.  It  is, 
perhaps,  only  one  among  many  friendships  of  a  like 
nature,  famous  because  Swift  was  a  great  man, 
and  stood  in  the  forefront  of  life's  stage.  But  there 
must  be  many  such  which  historically  pass  unheeded 
and  yet  may  be  a  source  of  pleasure  and  misery 
to  those  who  are  the  subject  of  them. 

Wiseacres  with  a  total  ignorance  of  psychology 
scout  the  possibility  of  these  friendships.  They 
shake  their  heads  wisely  and  say  that  every  friend- 
ship between  a  man  and  a  woman  must  end  in 
love;  they  maintain  this  opinion  in  the  face  of 
every  fact  which  proves  the  opposite.     They  would 


152  DEAN   SWIFT 

insist  on  maintaining  it  if  the  world  consisted 
entirely  of  these  friendships  and  Cupid  had  left 
the  stage  for  ever.  They  do  not,  however,  deserve 
serious  consideration.  These  alliances  between 
men  and  women  are  based  on  a  psychological  fact 
frequently  omitted  in  human  calculations.  Some 
men  have  in  them  moral  and  mental  characteristics 
to  which  they  find  no  response  in  the  character  of 
their  male  friends,  some  women  have  such  charac- 
teristics to  which  they  find  no  response  in  their 
women  friends.  Nor  is  this  true  merely  of  the 
mannish  woman  or  the  effeminate  man.  In  each 
case  the  expression  of  such  attributes  is  met  by 
a  dead  wall,  an  unsympathetic  blank.  Sometimes 
this  forms  the  greater  part  of  a  character,  call  it 
what  you  will,  the  woman's  mind  in  a  man,  the 
man's  mind  in  a  woman.  It  is  possibly  the  ideal 
perfection  of  the  qualities  which  ought  to  be  found 
in  a  man  or  woman.  If  this  demand  in  the  soul 
of  either  is  negatived  or  refused,  through  conven- 
tions or  other  external  convenience  for  the  un- 
thinking majority  (for  we  grant  that  conventions 
are  based  on  a  truth,  though  they  have  become  a 
lie),  the  result  is  pre-eminently  disastrous  for  the 
mind  making  the  demand,  just  as  the  denial  of  food 
is  bad  for  the  body. 

We  have  barely  learnt  the  alphabet  of  psychology- 
It  is  perhaps  an  impossibility  for  the  mind  of  the 
Teuton  to  understand  the  necessity  of  it. 

On  the  sound  of  Stella's  name  perhaps  we  hang, 
unwilling  to  let  slip  the  last  sweet  echo.     It  is  one  of 


DON   QUIXOTE  153 

the  happiest  and,  at  the  same  time,  most  unfortunate 
of  names.  It  is  the  name  of  one  of  those  women 
who  have  met  with  the  world's  most  heartfelt 
approval  and  deepest  reprobation,  with  the  world's 
scornful  blame  and  saddest  pity.  And  why?  Because 
she  followed  the  natural  dictates  of  her  heart  in  an 
unconventional  manner.  Let  those  who  stoop  the 
knee  in  the  temple  of  the  redoubtable  god  Convention 
beware  that  they  do  not  fall  into  a  pit  of  their  own 
digging.  It  is  the  illogical  result  of  an  illogical 
world,  which  takes  for  granted  the  vicious  brilliance 
of  charming  women  like  Nell  Gwyn,  and  offers  them 
the  homage  of  the  ages,  while  it  questions  the  sweet- 
souled  purity  of  a  pure  woman  like  Stella,  and 
blackens  her  name  with  vile  insinuations.  Nor  is 
it  content  with  this.  It  must  perforce  take  as  a 
burning  question,  to  be  discussed  in  every  detail, 
with  all  the  sickening  nakedness  of  the  divorce  court, 
the  question  of  Stella's  reputed  marriage  with  Swift. 
Again  why  ?  What  does  it  matter  to  us  or  to  pre- 
ceding and  succeeding  ages,  whether  Swift  was 
married  to  Stella  or  not.  This  one  fact  has  no  real 
bearing  on  the  ethics  of  the  case.  The  discussion 
is  an  impertinence  of  the  worst  type,  and  I  do  not 
propose  to  offer  an  opinion  as  to  whether  Swift  and 
Stella  were  married,  or  remained  true  to  those  ideals 
of  pure  friendship  which  can  exist  between  a  man 
and  woman  without  any  question  of  marriage,  or  the 
love  which  makes  such  a  demand. 

Esther  Johnson,   the    Stella   of  later  years,   was 
a  dark-haired,    dark-eyed    child   of   six   when   Swift 


154  DEAN   SWIFT 

entered  Sir  William  Temple's  household  as  secretary. 
Swift  tells  us  "her  father  was  a  younger  brother  of 
a  good  family  in  Nottinghamshire,  her  mother  of  a 
lower  degree."  Esther  was  too  pretty  and  attractive 
to  pass  unnoticed.  She  was  perhaps  the  pet  of  the 
family,  and  indeed  was  so  much  noticed  and  cared 
for  by  Sir  William  Temple,  that  those  who  spend 
their  time  washing  up  in  an  obscure  light  in  the  back 
kitchen  of  history  have  declared  that  she  was  his 
natural  daughter.  The  same  greasemongers  have 
pointed  to  Swift  as  a  natural  son  of  Temple,  and 
assigned  this  as  a  reason  against  the  possibility  of 
marriage  between  Swift  and  Stella.  Their  theories 
may  be  disregarded. 

Stella  was  a  fragile  child  at  this  age.  Probably 
this  was  why  he  undertook  her  education,  for  possibly 
sedentary  pursuits  were  more  suitable  for  her  delicate 
health  than  more  active  ones. 

From  this  early  age  she  was  his  chief  companion 
in  the  Temple  household,  a  fact  which  renders  all  the 
more  pathetic  the  resolution  written  down  in  his 
notebook  a  few  years  later  not  to  let  young  people, 
especially  children,  come  near  him.  It  is  coupled 
with  a  resolution  not  to  marry  a  young  woman — nor 
force  his  company  on  the  young.  His  foresight,  even 
at  this  age,  warns  him  against  the  time-worn  error  of 
carping  at  the  present  to  the  advantage  of  the  past, 
and  this  he  resolves  not  to  do.  At  the  same  time 
these  resolutions  made  for  a  later  age  point,  perhaps, 
to  some  premature  maturity  of  thought.  Swift  was 
one  of  those  men  of  whom  we  can  only  say  that  they 


DON   QUIXOTE  155 

are  born  old,  their  judgments  are  mature,  and  their 
time  and  thought  devoted  to  the  interests  of  a  great 
world  rather  than  to  their  own,  at  an  age  when  many 
young  men  think  only  of  love  and  sport.  Therefore 
it  did  not  seem  absurd  to  him,  when  a  young  man, 
to  make  resolutions  for  middle  age.  This  mature 
outlook  on  humanity  frequently,  as  in  Swift's  case, 
accompanies  that  much  abused,  much  suffering  victim 
known  as  the  artistic  temperament,  which  has  more 
method  in  its  madness  than  the  most  boasted  sanity. 
It  has  also  a  conscience.  The  artistic  conscience 
results  in  the  perfection  of  achievement,  and  scorns 
the  petty  and  numerous  malformations  of  the  so- 
called  practical  whose  fretting  hurry  can  only  result 
in  deformity  both  of  soul  and  achievement.  The 
artistic  temperament  alone  produces  great  results. 
The  soul  of  the  artist  is  that  which  we  find  in  great 
saints  and  great  sinners,  but  it  is  one  and  the  same 
soul.  It  is  the  soul  capable  of  giving  up  everything 
for  one  object,  whatever  the  object :  with  Swift  the 
object,  sought  and  gained,  was  the  lasting  good  of 
his  fellowmen. 

On  the  death  of  Temple  Stella's  fortune  amounted 
to  ;^ 1 500,  the  interest  on  which.  Swift  tells  us,  "was 
but  a  scanty  maintenance  in  so  dear  a  country  for  one 
of  her  spirit.  Under  this  consideration,  and  indeed 
very  much  for  my  own  satisfaction,  who  had  good 
friends  and  acquaintances  in  Ireland,  I  prevailed  with 
her  and  her  dear  friend  and  companion,  to  draw  what 
money  they  had  into  Ireland,  besides  the  advantage 
of  returning  it,  and  all  necessaries  of  life  at  half  the 


156  DEAN   SWIFT 

price.  They  complied  with  my  advice,  and  soon 
after  came  over :  but  I,  happening  to  continue  some 
time  longer  in  England,  they  were  much  discouraged 
to  live  in  Dublin,  where  they  were  wholly  strangers  : 
she  was  at  that  time  about  nineteen  years  old, 
and  her  person  was  soon  distinguished.  But  the 
adventure  looked  so  like  a  frolic,  the  censure  held 
for  some  time,  as  if  there  were  a  secret  history  in 
such  a  removal ;  which,  however,  soon  blew  off  by 
her  excellent  conduct." 

Perhaps  herein  hangs  a  tale.  There  was  un- 
doubtedly room  here  for  the  pleasant  machinations 
of  Dame  Gossip,  who  is  daughter  to  a  microbe  im- 
perceptible to  the  honest  mind.  Swift,  with  his 
experience  of  the  world,  knew  this  only  too  well, 
and  throughout  Stella's  life  in  Ireland  took  the 
utmost  care  to  avoid  giving  any  opportunity  for  the 
ill-natured.  Thus  he  never  saw  Stella  except  in 
the  presence  of  Mrs.  Dingley,  her  companion,  and 
addressed  his  letters  to  both,  so  that  the  letters 
known  collectively  as  the  "Journal  to  Stella"  are 
written  both  to  Stella  and  her  companion.  It  may 
be  as  well  to  remark  that  the  name  Stella  used 
here  is  an  anachronism,  as  Swift  did  not  give  this 
name  to  Esther  Johnson  until  after  his  four  years' 
residence  in  London  which  terminated  in  171 3.  For 
the  sake  of  convenience,  however,  we  will  speak 
of  her  from  now  as  Stella. 

It  is  interesting  to  note  how  different  in  those 
respects  was  Swift's  treatment  of  Miss  Vanhomrigh, 
and  it  points  to  the  extreme  care  which  he  exercised 


DON   QUIXOTE  157 

over  Stella  and  every  detail  of  life  as  it  affected 
her.  To  Miss  Vanhomrigh  Swift  left  the  responsi- 
bility of  her  own  discretion,  though  again  and  again 
he  warned  her  against  foolish  acts  and  with  her 
he  merely  used  the  precaution  necessary  from  his 
own  point  of  view.  Stella  herself  testifies  to  his 
constant  care  of  her. 

"  When  men  began  to  call  me  fair, 
You  interposed  your  timely  care  : 
You  early  taught  me  to  despise 
The  ogling  of  a  coxcomb's  eyes  ; 
Shewed  where  my  judgment  was  misplaced  ; 
Refined  my  fancy  and  my  taste." 

With  regard  to  suitors,  perhaps  Swift  was  a 
relentless  guardian.  The  story  goes  that  one  of 
Stella's  first  admirers,  the  Rev.  Dr.  Tindall,  met 
with  small  mercy  at  his  hands.  Swift  naturall}'^ 
was  unwilling  to  let  Stella  marry  any  one  beneath 
her  in  intellectual  attainments,  for  he  saw  that  in 
her  intellect  predominated  over  heart,  and,  if  she 
were  married  to  a  fool,  life  would  be  a  perpetual 
misery  to  her.  Certainly  in  her  case,  while  the 
companionship  of  a  brilliant  man  was  a  happy 
thing,  marriage  with  either  a  fool  or  a  genius  would 
in  all  probability  have  proved  unfortunate. 

The  portrait  of  Stella,  which  must  have  been 
painted  during  the  early  years  of  her  residence  in 
Ireland,  represents  a  young  woman  of  regular 
features  and  well-developed  figure.  Her  eyes  are 
rather  full,  with  perhaps  that  expression  of  wonder 
in  them  with  which  Stella,  an  essentially  thoughtful 
woman,  must  have  regarded  life.     Her   hair   waves 


158  DEAN    SWIFT 

loosely  back  from  a  fine  forehead  whose  breadth 
expresses  intellectual  power,  and  whose  height 
implies  the  power  of  original  thought  and  imagina- 
tion. It  is  presumably  the  face  of  a  woman  who 
would  have  little  regard  for  feminine  smallness, 
and  would  be  well  fitted  to  be  a  companion  of  a 
man  of  brilliant  intellect.  Her  mouth  is  distinctly 
humorous,  perhaps  slightly  sensuous.  Reasonable, 
clear-headed,  impassionate,  she  was  well  suited  to 
the  role  which  she  was  allowed  to  play,  without 
any  detriment  to  her  own  happiness  and  very  much 
to  the  increase  of  Swift's  pleasure  and  comfort,  for 
she  was  the  one  friend  to  whom  he  would  look 
for  unfailing  sympathy  and  appreciation  in  every 
crisis  of  his  life  either  of  happiness  or  misfortune. 
"She  was  but  little  versed,"  says  Swift,  "in  the 
common  topics  of  female  chat ;  scandal,  censure  and 
detraction  never  came  out  of  her  mouth :  yet  among 
a  few  friends,  in  private  conversation,  she  made 
little  ceremony  in  discovering  her  contempt  of  a 
coxcomb,  and  describing  all  his  follies  to  the  life  : 
but  the  follies  of  her  own  sex  she  was  rather 
inclined  to  extenuate  or  to  pity."  He  tells  a  story 
of  her  intrepid  coolness  in  danger.  "  With  all  the 
softness  of  temper  that  became  a  lady,  she  had  the 
personal  character  of  a  hero.  She  and  her  friend 
having  removed  their  lodgings  to  a  new  house, 
which  stood  solitary,  a  parcel  of  rogues  armed, 
attempted  the  house,  where  there  was  only  one  boy. 
She  was  then  about  four  and  twenty :  and  having 
been  warned  to  apprehend  some  such  attempt,  she 


STELLA 

FROM    THE    l'Al.\riN(.    BY    CHAS.    JERVAS    IN     1  HE    DLl'.l.lN    I'ORI  RAIT   GALLERY 


DON   QUIXOTE  159 

learned  the  management  of  a  pistol,  and  the  other 
women  and  servants  being  half  dead  with  fear,  she 
stole  softly  to  her  dining-room  window,  put  on  a 
black  hood  to  prevent  being  seen,  primed  the  pistol 
fresh,  gently  lifted  up  the  sash,  and  taking  her  aim 
with  the  utmost  presence  of  mind,  discharged  the 
pistol,  loaded  with  bullets,  into  the  body  of  one 
villain  who  stood  the  fairest  mark.  The  fellow, 
mortally  v/ounded,  was  carried  off  by  the  rest  and 
died  the  next  morning,  but  his  companions  could 
not  be  found."  Perhaps  we  are  foolish  enough  to 
wish  that  Stella  had  missed  her  aim,  but  at  any 
rate,  she  has  established  her  character  for  coolness. 
Coldness  of  temperament  was  the  sort  which  is 
endowed  with  that  extreme  faithfulness  of  disposition 
which  so  frequently  finds  its  best  manifestation  in 
friendship,  and  is  seldom  capable  of  meanness  or 
treachery.  She  was  a  woman  of  few  friends,  as  Swift 
explains.  "  From  her  own  disposition,  at  least,  as 
much  as  from  the  frequent  want  of  health,  she 
seldom  made  any  visits,  but  her  own  lodgings,  from 
before  twenty  years  old,  were  frequented  by  many 
persons  of  the  graver  sort,  who  all  respected  her 
highly,  upon  her  good  sense,  good  manners,  and 
conversation.  Among  these  were  the  late  Primate 
Lindsay,  Bishop  Lloyd,  Bishop  Ashe,  Bishop  Brown, 
Bishop  Sterne,  and  Bishop  Pulleys,  with  some  others 
of  later  date ;  and  indeed  the  greatest  number  of 
her  acquaintance  was  among  the  clergy." 

Her    one  woman   friend   appears    to  have    been 
Rebecca  Dingley,   who   lived   with    her   throughout 


i6o  DEAN   SWIFT 

the  whole  of  her  life  in  Ireland.  The  two  ladies 
always  lived  in  lodgings,  exchanging  their  own  for 
those  of  Swift  during  his  absence.  This  arrange- 
ment was  due  partly  to  a  desire  for  economy,  partly, 
no  doubt,  to  the  fact  that  it  afforded  Swift  a  better 
opportunity  of  keeping  an  eye  on  his  adopted  ward. 
Their  goings  out  and  their  comings  in  were  known 
to  him  as  were  his  to  them,  for  the  most  part. 
Every  detail  of  their  lives  appears  to  have  been  of 
unfailing  interest  to  him.  Their  financial  affairs 
were  watched  over  by  his  agent. 

More  than  this  Swift  supplemented  Mrs.  Ding- 
ley's  income  by  an  allowance  of  i^20  a  year,  thus 
enabling  Stella  to  enjoy  her  companionship  without 
any  difficulty.  Their  small  trials  and  enjoyments  all 
receive  their  due  notice  in  Swift's  letters  to  Stella: 
their  success  at  cards,  their  small  gains  and  losses,  do 
not  escape  his  remark.  "You  win  eight  shillings! 
you  win  eight  fiddlesticks.  Faith,  you  say  nothing 
of  what  you  lose,  young  woman  ! "  All  their  mutual 
acquaintances  are  commented  on ;  there  is  much 
gossip  of  a  kindly  nature  in  his  daily  journal.  No 
detail  is  allowed  to  escape.  "  Good  morrow,  my 
mistresses  both,  good,  morrow.  Stella  will  be  peep- 
ing out  of  her  room  at  Mrs.  Caudres  down  upon  the 
folks  as  they  come  from  church  :  and  there  comes 
Mrs.  Probeyard,  that's  my  Lady  Southwell,  and 
there's  Lady  Betty  Rochfort."  We  know  that  Stella 
provided  Swift  with  this  intelligence  from  references 
in  his  letters,  but  so  far  none  of  her  correspondence 
has  been  discovered.     We  would  give  the  world  to 


DON   QUIXOTE  i6i 

be  allowed  to  see  her  letters  to  him.  Sometimes  she 
evidently  expresses  a  desire  to  know  more  of  politics. 
"  You  want  politics :  faith,  I  can't  think  of  any,  but 
maybe  at  night  I  may  tell  you  a  passage."  At  times 
she  is  not  quite  satisfied  with  his  account  of  his  friends. 
Once  she  has  certainly  asked  to  know  more  about 
the  Vanhomrigh  family.  Her  health  is  a  never-failing 
source  of  anxiety  to  him.  He  constantly  prescribes 
for  her,  and  is  perpetually  trying  to  impress  on  her 
the  necessity  of  fresh  air  and  exercise,  in  accordance 
with  his  own  example,  for  he  had  followed  this 
practice  ever  since  the  days  at  Moor  Park,  when  he 
would  run  up  the  hill  behind  the  house  every  two 
hours.  "I  desire  in  two  days,"  he  writes,  "if  pos- 
sible, to  go  and  live  at  Chelsea  for  the  air,  and  put 
myself  under  a  necessity  of  walking  to  and  from 
London  every  day."  He  jeers  at  the  Irish  ladies  for 
their  deficiency  in  this  respect.  "  When  I  pass  the 
Mall  in  the  evening  it  is  prodigious  to  see  the 
number  of  ladies  walking  there,  and  I  always  cry 
shame  at  the  ladies  of  Ireland  who  never  walk  at  all, 
as  if  their  legs  were  no  use  but  to  be  laid  aside,"  He 
urges  the  beauty  of  Nature  as  an  incitement.  "  Don't 
you  begin  to  see  the  flowers  and  blossoms  of  the 
field?"  Again,  later,  "Do  you  know  that  about  our 
town  we  are  mowing  already,  making  hay,  and  it 
smells  so  sweet  as  we  walk  through  the  flowery 
meads."  Walking  was  his  sole  exercise,  and  proved 
to  him,  as  to  many  other  people,  a  constant  source  of 
pleasure,  acting  as  a  direct  counteraction  to  the 
mental  strain  which  he  had  perpetually  to  undergo. 


i62  DEAN   SWIFT 

He  has  another  reason  !     "  The  days  are  long  enough 
to  walk  in  the  Park  after  dinner,  and  so  I  do  when- 
ever it  is  fair.     This  walking   is  a  strange  remedy. 
Mr.  Prior  walks  to  make  himself  fat,  and  I  to  bring 
myself  down :    he  has  generally  a  cough  which   he 
only   calls   a  cold :   we  often  walk   round   the  Park 
together."     He  knows,  too,  that  every  detail  affecting 
him  will  be  interesting  to  Stella,  and  he  has  provided 
us   with    a  familiar   picture   of  himself.      His   little 
economies  are  a  shock  to  the  feelings  of  those  who 
have  grown  used  to  looking  on  him  as  the  leading 
statesman  of  his  day.     "  Come,  come,  young  women, 
I  keep  a  good  fire :  it  costs  me  twelvepence  a  week, 
I  fear  something  more  :  pay  me,  and  I'll  have  one  in 
my  bedchamber  too."     It  pleases  him  to  pretend  that 
they   are   acting  the   critic.      His   great  mind,  as  is 
always  the  case,  loves  to  have  its  little   pretences ; 
the   mind  which   is   strung  to  the  highest   issues  is 
always  capable  of  the  greatest  relaxation,  therefore 
it  is  not  true  to  say  that  little  things  please  little 
minds ;    little    things   please  great    minds.       Hence 
Swift,  in  writing  to  Stella,  loves  to  linger  on  the  days 
of  their  life  at   Moor  Park,  when   the  child  of  six 
prattled   in  that   baby  language  known  only  to  the 
initiated,  and  in  many  of  his  letters  he  has  recourse 
to    this    little    language.      Dear  good   people    have 
chosen  to   take  this   as   a   proof  of  his  insincerity. 
But  we  will  say  no  more  of  this  little  fallacy.     There 
are  little  jokes  to  be  made.     "  April  i.     The  Duke  of 
Buckingham's   horse   fell   down   last   night   with   an 
earthquake,  and  is  half  swallowed  up ;  won't  you  go 


DON   QUIXOTE  163 

and  see  it  ?  An  April  fool,  an  April  fool,  Oho  young 
woman.  Well,  don't  be  angry,  I'll  make  you  an  April 
fool  no  more,  till  next  time."  The  smallest  story 
finds  its  place.  "Going  this  morning  to  town  I  saw 
two  old  lame  fellows  walking  to  a  brandy  shop, 
and  when  they  got  to  the  door,  stood  a  long  time 
complimenting  who  should  go  in  first :  though  this 
be  no  joke  to  tell,  it  was  an  admirable  one  to  see." 
He  likes  to  draw  pen  pictures  of  himself.  "And 
now  let  us  come  and  see  what  this  dreary  letter  of 
Mrs.  D.  says.  Come  out,  letter,  come  out  from 
between  the  sheets ;  here  it  is  underneath,  and  it 
won't  come  out.  Come  out  again,  I  say  :  so  there. 
Here  it  is.  What  says  Presto  to  me  pray  ?  says  it. 
Come  and  let  me  answer  for  you  to  your  ladies. 
Hold  up  your  head  then,  like  a  good  letter." 

"  It  has  snowed  terribly  all  night,  and  in  vengeance 
cold,  I  am  not  up  yet,  but  cannot  write  long,  my 
hands  will  freeze.  'Is  there  a  good  fire,  Patrick?' 
'  Yes,  sir.'  'Then  I'll  rise:  come,  take  away  the  candle.' 
You  must  know  1  write  in  the  dark  side  of  my  bed- 
chamber and  am  forced  to  have  a  candle  till  I  rise,  for 
the  bed  stands  between  me  and  the  window,  and  I 
keep  the  curtains  shut  this  cold  weather.  '  So,  pray 
let  me  rise,  and,  Patrick,  take  away  the  candle.'" 
Again,  "  I  went  last  night  to  put  some  coal  on  my 
fire  after  Patrick  had  gone  to  bed,  and  there  I  saw 
in  a  closet  a  poor  linnet  he  had  brought  over  to 
Dingley.  It  cost  him  sixpence,  and  is  as  tame  as 
a  dormouse.  I  believe  he  does  not  know  he  is  a 
bird :  where  you  put  him  there  he  stands,  and  seems 


i64  DEAN    SWIFT 

to  have  neither  hope  nor  fear;  1  suppose  in  a  week 
he  will  die  of  the  spleen." 

He  likes  to  think  that  their  thoughts  are  centred 
on  him;  "and  so  you  kept  Presto's  little  birthday, 
I  warrant.  I  would  to  God  I  had  been  in  the 
hearth  rather  than  here  where  I  have  no  manner 
of  pleasure,  nothing  but  eternal  business  on  my 
hands."  He  assures  them  that  his  thoughts  are  on 
them.  "  Do  you  know  that  every  syllable  I  write, 
I  hold  my  lips  just  for  all  the  world  as  if  I  were 
talking  in  our  own  little  language  to  M.  D.  Faith, 
I  am  very  sill3/,  but  I  can't  help  it  for  my  life."  "No, 
faith,  you  are  just  here  upon  this  little  piece  of 
paper,  and  therefore  I  see  and  talk  with  you  every 
evening  constantly,  and  sometimes  in  the  morning." 

He  tells  them  all  his  plans,  keeps  them  an  fait 
with  the  political  world.  They  are  familiar  with 
the  inner  circle,  and  know  long  before  the  general 
public,  the  possible  issue  of  events.  His  literary 
works  are  not  anonymous  to  them.  For  the  most 
part  they  anticipate  the  public  in  knowledge  of  the 
nature  of  the  several  works.  Swift's  political  friends 
are  more  than  mere  names  to  them,  they  know  the 
change  which  must  ensue  in  his  circle,  and  under- 
stand its  significance.  "  Prithee,  don't  you  observe," 
he  writes  in  May,  1711,  "how  strangely  I  have 
changed  my  manner  and  company  of  living?  I 
never  go  to  a  coffee-house.  You  hear  no  more 
of  Addison,  Steele,  Harley,  Lady  Lucy,  Mrs.  Finch, 
Lord  Somers,  Halifax,  etc." 

He   is   always   ready   to    sympathize   with   them 


DON   QUIXOTE  165 

and  soothe  Stella's  apprehension.  Again  and  again 
he  assures  her  that  her  happiness  is  his  first  care.  "I 
will  say  no  more,  but  beg  you  to  be  easy,  till 
fortune  takes  her  course,  and  to  believe  that  M.  D.'s 
felicity  is  the  great  end  I  aim  at  in  my  pursuits.  And 
so  let  us  talk  no  more  on  this  subject,  which  makes 
me  melancholy,  and  that  I  would  fain  divert.  Believe 
me,  no  man  breathing  at  present  has  less  share 
of  happiness  than  I :  I  do  not  say  I  am  unhappy 
at  all,  but  that  everything  here  is  tasteless  to  me 
for  want  of  being  what  I  could  be."  This  is  the 
canker  in  the  bud — the  side-light  thrown  on  the 
brilliant  scene  of  the  political  stage— the  lining  of 
the  coat  decorated  with  the  jewels  of  political 
favour.  Swift's  distrust  of  his  position  is  no  new 
thing  to  Stella.  The  consciousness  of  their  faithful 
love  for  him  has  before  been  presented  to  him  in 
pleasing  contrast  to  his  faithless  friends  in  the 
great  world.  "  Farewell,  my  dearest  lives  and 
delights,  I  love  you  better  than  ever  if  possible, 
as  hope  saved,  I  do  and  ever  will.  God  Almighty 
bless  you  ever  and  make  us  happy  together.  I 
pray  for  this  twice  every  day,  and  I  hope  God  will 
hear  my  poor  hearty  prayers.  Remember,  if  I  am 
used  ill  and  ungratefully,  as  I  have  formerly  been, 
'tis  what  I  am  prepared  for  and  shall  not  wonder 
at  it.  Yet  I  am  now  envied  and  thought  in  high 
favour,  and  have  every  day  numbers  of  considerable 
men,  teazing  me  to  solicit  for  them,  and  the 
ministry  all  use  me  perfectly  well,  and  all  that 
know   them   say   they   love    me.      Yet    I   can   count 


i66  DEAN   SWIFT 

upon  nothing,  nor  will  but  M.  D.'s  kindness.  They 
think  me  useful :  they  pretended  they  were  afraid 
of  none  but  me  :  and  that  they  resolved  to  have 
me,  they  have  often  confessed  this,  yet  all  makes 
little  impression  upon  me." 

Swift's  doubt  of  the  stability  of  his  position  no 
doubt  had  a  very  depressing  effect  on  Stella,  whose 
outlook  must  have  been  shadowed  and  brightened 
in  accordance  with  his  prospects.  For  the  small 
interests  of  her  household  would  not  be  enough 
to  satisfy  a  woman  of  her  mental  power,  and  her 
vision  must  always  have  been  straining  towards 
that  greater  world  in  which  the  friend  in  whom 
all  her  hopes  centred  was  moving.  The  small-talk 
of  the  circle  in  which  she  moved,  the  Walls,  the 
Stoytes,  etc.,  would  not  be  enough  to  satisfy  her.  We 
are  assured  by  Swift  that  "  By  returning  very  few 
visits,  she  had  not  much  company  of  her  own  sex, 
except  those  whom  she  most  loved  for  their  easi- 
ness, or  esteemed  for  their  good  sense,  and  those, 
not  insisting  on  ceremony,  came  often  to  her.  But 
she  rather  chose  men  for  her  companions,  the 
usual  topics  of  ladies'  discourse  being  such  as  she 
had  little  knowledge  of,  and  less  relish.  Yet  no 
man  was  upon  the  rack  to  entertain  her,  for  she 
easily  descended  to  anything  that  was  innocent  or 
diverting.  News,  politics,  censure  of  family  manage- 
ment or  towntalk,  she  always  diverted  to  some- 
thing else  :  but  these  indeed  seldom  happened,  for 
she  chose  her  company  better :  and  therefore  many 
who  mistook   her  and   themselves,   having   solicited 


DON   QUIXOTE  167 

her  acquaintance,  and  finding  themselves  disap- 
pointed, after  a  few  visits  dropped  off:  and  she  was 
never  known  to  inquire  into  the  reason,  nor  asked 
what  was  become  of  them." 

Such  indifference  to  casual  acquaintance  points 
to  the  fact  that  her  chief  interests  were  outside 
them.  The  Dublin  ladies,  languid  and  incapable 
of  much  exertion  either  mental  or  physical,  must 
have  looked  on  Stella  as  a  prodigy,  incomprehen- 
sible to  the  ordinary  intelligence.  Her  calmness 
in  emergency  was  proverbial,  for  we  are  told  by 
Swift  that  fainting  was  unknown  to  her,  and  that 
she  did  not  scream  or  run  at  the  sight  of  a  mouse. 
Thus  it  was  that  Swift  could  turn  to  her  in  every 
tempest,  for  there  is  no  truer  haven  for  storm- 
tossed  manhood  than  the  mind  of  a  woman  to 
whom  feminine  pettiness  and  scheming  are  un- 
known, and  who  has  an  outlook  beyond  and  above 
the  small  concerns  of  life,  without  necessarily 
neglecting  them. 

Swift's  knowledge  of  Stella,  therefore,  whose  cold- 
ness of  temperament  resulted  in  a  natural  aptitude 
for  friendship,  was  not  enough  to  prepare  him  for 
a  friendship  with  another  woman  of  an  entirely 
different  temperament.  Esther  Vanhomrigh,  whose 
misfortune  lay  purely  in  her  own  character,  was  ill- 
suited  to  become  Swift's  pupil,  entirely  unsuitable 
for  friendship  with  him  or  any  other  man.  Mrs. 
Vanhomrigh's  family  consisted  of  two  sons  and  two 
daughters,  of  whom  Esther  was  not  yet  twenty  and 
Molly   a  little   younger.     They  lived  in  a  house  in 


i68  DEAN   SWIFT 

Bury  Street,  St.  James',  near  Swift's  lodgings,  and 
their  drawing-room  formed  the  centre  of  a  society  of 
distinguished  people.  They  were  fond  of  society, 
and  very  hospitable,  and  here  Swift  met  many  of 
his  friends,  among  them  Sir  Andrew  Fountaine, 
Lady  Betty  Berkeley,  and  others :  he  was  a  regular 
guest,  and  admitted  on  terms  of  a  good  deal  of 
intimacy;  probably  he  was  there  almost  daily.  He 
looked  on  it  as  one  of  the  houses  where  he  could 
claim  hospitality  at  any  time.  In  return  for  this  he 
undertook  to  some  extent  the  education  of  the  two 
girls,  whom  he  found  intelligent  and  worthy  of  his 
trouble.  Esther's  capacity  was  beyond  the  average, 
and  her  much-developed  intellect  tended  perhaps  to 
destroy  her  sound  judgment.  She,  like  Stella,  was 
removed  from  friends  of  her  own  sex  and  age,  by 
her  incapacity  to  sympathize  with  their  pursuits; 
her  interests  lay  in  wider  issues.  Books  were  her 
companions,  for  her  age,  of  necessity,  prevented  her 
from  seeing  much  of  men,  whose  friendship  she 
preferred.  Thus  Swift  was  the  first  male  friend 
with  whom  there  had  been  for  her  any  possibility 
of  untrammelled  intercourse.  He  was  then  forty- 
three,  a  man  whose  experience  and  brilliant  powers 
of  conversation  rendered  him  singularly  attractive  to 
this  girl  of  twenty.  Probably,  too,  his  notice  flattered 
her,  for  she  was  at  the  age  when  her  mind  had 
crossed  the  barrier  between  girlhood  and  woman- 
hood, and  was  in  need  of  a  guiding  hand  to  prevent 
her  from  being  the  victim  of  those  pitfalls  into  which 
the   morbidly   minded   are  so  apt   to  stray,  namely, 


VAXESSAS   BOWER,   THE   ABBEY.   CETA-liRlDdE 


THE  ABBEY,  CELLBRIFXIE,   THE   RESilENCE   OF    HE.STER   VANHO.MRKIH 


DON   QUIXOTE  169 

introspection  and  unhealthy  asceticism  of  one  kind 
or  another.  Her  portrait  represents  her  as  of  the 
weak  intellectual  type.  It  was  above  all  important 
for  Esther,  as  for  so  many  other  girls  who  are 
allowed  to  pore  over  books  to  the  exclusion  of 
humanity,  that  at  the  age  when  the  mind  perforce 
turns  to  humanity  and  wearies  of  books,  there 
should  have  been  a  helping  hand,  but  for  her  it 
should  have  been  the  hand  of  a  wise  woman,  of  any 
one  rather  than  a  man  like  Swift,  whose  qualities 
were  exactly  of  the  sort  to  be  dangerous  through 
their  attractiveness.  She  was  weak,  he  was  strong; 
she  was  passionate  and  impetuous,  he  was  calm, 
cool  and  logical;  she  was  wildly  romantic,  he  was 
singularly  reasonable  and  deficient  in  romance.  From 
the  very  force  of  his  character,  which  made  all  women 
bow  to  him  as  to  a  superior  being,  he  reduced  her 
to  the  position  of  abject  slave  and  worshipper,  and 
that  most  deadly  of  all  diseases  Schwdrmerei  took 
possession  of  her.  Let  those  take  pity  on  her  who 
realize  the  insidious  nature  of  this  terrible  moral 
weakness,  the  existence  of  which  in  women  of  every 
age  and  occupation  points  to  great  defects  in  their 
training.  Had  her  mother  been  wise  she  would  have 
recognized  that  the  only  possible  end  of  this  must  be 
disastrous  for  Esther;  but  those  were  not  the  days  of 
experimental  education,  and  mothers  did  not  carry 
about  with  them  psychological  thermometers.  She 
was  therefore  allowed  to  go  on  unheeded  until  Swift 
found  to  his  dismay  that  his  lessons  were  disregarded, 
while  he  himself  received  the  most  profound  attention 


I70  DEAN   SWIFT 

from  his  pupil.  He  judged  rightly  that  the  days  of 
books  were  at  an  end  for  her,  though  he  was  wrong 
in  thinking  that  her  feeling  for  him  was  a  passing 
fancy.  Incidentally  he  had  introduced  an  ethical 
tone  into  his  lectures  which  perhaps  tended  to  the 
increase  of  the  unfortunate  attachment. 

Miss  Vanhomrigh's  open  confession  of  love  to 
him,  justified  to  her  by  Swift's  own  teaching  that 
your  opinions  and  feelings  should  never  be  concealed, 
took  him  entirely  by  surprise.  There  must  have 
flashed  into  his  mind  at  that  moment  the  picture 
of  the  calm,  proud,  yet  loving  woman  then  living 
in  his  own  rooms  at  Dublin,  who  had  been  his 
constant  friend  and  companion  for  more  than  twenty 
years  with  perfect  satisfaction  to  them  both.  No 
wonder  that,  judged  in  the  light  of  Stella's  dignity 
and  womanliness,  this  ardent  unreasoning  display  of 
passion  was  incomprehensible  to  him.  He  had 
known  on  terms  of  intimacy  a  great  number  of 
women  in  the  course  of  the  last  twenty  years,  but 
none  had  been  guilty  of  such  an  indiscretion,  and  his 
power  of  psychological  perception  was  not  great 
enough  to  make  him  understand.  He  merely  put 
it  on  one  side,  hoping  that  it  would  pass  away.  Thus 
a  few  months  passed,  leaving  Esther  in  a  miserable 
state  of  uncertainty,  while  Swift  perhaps  went  on 
unheeding.  At  the  end  of  that  time,  however,  he 
discovered  that  time  had  wrought  no  change  in  her 
feelings,  and  he  saw  that  he  must  take  some  definite 
step  to  improve  matters.  Marriage  with  her  or  with 
any  one  else  was  entirely  out  of  the  question  for  him  ; 


DON   QUIXOTE  171 

if  such  a  thing  had  been  possible  Stella  would  un- 
doubtedly have  been  his  choice.  He  therefore  wrote 
the  poem  known  as  "  Cadenus  and  Vanessa,"  in  which 
he  tried  to  show  her  finally  that  all  hope  of  love  between 
them  was  impossible.  This  should  have  been  enough, 
as  Swift  thought,  but  it  was  not.  He  has  been  much 
blamed  for  temporizing.  But  surely  he  is  not  to 
blame.  There  are  two  possible  reasons  for  the 
course  he  followed :  he  may  not  have  understood 
the  power  that  an  unsatisfied  passion  has  of  con- 
suming a  man  or  woman  body  and  soul;  it  was 
almost  an  impossibility  for  a  man  of  his  temperament 
to  understand  it.  Or  he  may  have  thought,  as  the 
event  proved,  that  any  attempt  to  put  an  end  forcibly 
to  Esther's  love  for  him  would  be  extremely  dis- 
astrous. He  probably  knew  that  interference  by 
force  does  not  put  an  end  to  love,  it  only  tends  to 
increase  it.  He  therefore  adopted  a  policy  of  not 
seeing  her  and  of  writing  to  her  as  little  as  possible. 
His  departure  from  London  helped  him  in  this 
determination,  but  he  was  constantly  recalled  to  a 
sense  of  his  obligations.  Letter  after  letter  followed 
him  urging  him  to  write.  "  There  is  now  three  long 
weeks  passed  since  you  wrote  to  me.  Oh !  happy 
Dublin  that  can  claim  all  your  thoughts,  and  happy 
Mrs.  Emerson  that  could  hear  from  you  the  moment 
that  you  landed.  Had  it  not  been  for  her  I  should 
be  yet  more  uneasy  than  I  am.  I  really  believe 
before  you  leave  Ireland  I  shall  give  you  just  reason 
to  wish  I  did  not  know  my  letters,  or  at  least  that  I 
could  not  write :  and  I  had  rather  you  should  wish  so 


172  DEAN   SWIFT 

than  entirely  forget  me."  A  persistent  determination 
to  include  Molly  the  younger  sister  in  his  communi- 
cations only  roused  jealous  replies.  "  Confess,  have 
you  once  thought  of  me  since  you  wrote  to  my 
mother  at  Chester  ?  which  letter  I  assure  you  I  take 
very  ill.  My  mother  and  I  have  counted  the  Molls 
and  the  Hessys  :  it  is  true  the  number  is  equal,  but 
you  talk  to  Moll  and  only  say  '  Now  Hessy  grumbles.' 
How  can  you  indeed  possibly  be  so  ill-natured  to 
make  me  either  quarrel  or  grumble  when  you  are  at 
so  great  a  distance  that  it  is  impossible  for  me  to 
gain  by  doing  so  ?  Besides,  you  proposed  the  letter 
should  be  directed  to  me." 

In  the  case  of  a  woman  of  different  character,  pride 
would  have  stepped  in  to  interfere.  But  passion  was 
oblivious  to  all  considerations  of  pride  and  delicacy. 
It  had  degenerated  into  mania,  and  there  was  no 
possibility  of  lessening  it.  Circumstances,  moreover, 
now  joined  hands  against  Swift.  The  death  of  Mrs. 
Vanhomrigh  in  17 14  left  the  girls  helpless  in  the 
hands  of  lawyers,  for  they  were  on  bad  terms  with 
their  brothers.  Thus  a  heart-broken  appeal  from 
Esther,  based  on  the  plea  of  their  helpless  condition, 
roused  Swift's  feelings  of  chivalry.  "  You  cannot  but 
be  sensible  (at  least  in  some  degree)  of  the  many 
uneasinesses  I  am  slave  to  :  a  wretch  of  a  brother, 
cunning  executors  and  importunate  creditors  of  my 
mother's — things  I  can  no  way  avoid  being  subject  to 
at  present,  and  weighty  enough  to  sink  greater  spirits 
than  mine  without  some  support.  Once  I  had  a 
friend   that   would    see    me    sometimes,   and    either 


DON   QUIXOTE  173 

commend  what  I  did  or  advise  me  what  to  do,  which 
banished  all  my  uneasiness.  But  now,  when  my 
misfortunes  are  increased  by  being  in  a  disagreeable 
place,  among  strange,  prying,  deceitful  people  whose 
company  is  so  far  from  an  amusement,  that  it  is  a 
very  great  punishment,  you  fly  me,  and  give  me  no 
reason,  but  that  we  ai;e  amongst  fools  and  must 
submit.  I  am  very  well  satisfied  we  are  amongst 
such,  but  I  know  no  reason  for  having  my  happiness 
sacrificed  to  their  caprice.  You  once  had  a  maxim, 
which  was  to  act  what  was  right  and  not  mind  what 
the  world  said.  1  wish  you  would  keep  to  it  now. 
Pray  what  can  be  wrong  in  seeing  and  advising  an 
unhappy  young  woman?  I  cannot  imagine.  You 
cannot  but  know  that  your  frowns  make  my  life 
insupportable.  You  have  taught  me  to  distinguish 
and  then  to  leave  me  miserable.  Now  all  I  beg  is 
that  you  will  for  once  counterfeit  (since  you  cannot 
otherwise)  that  indulgent  friend  you  once  were,  till  I 
get  the  better  of  these  difficulties,  for  my  sister's 
sake  :  for  were  not  she  involved,  who,  I  know,  is  not 
able  to  manage  them  as  I  am,  I  have  a  nobler  soul 
than  to  sit  struggling  with  misfortune,  when  at  the  end 
I  can't  promise  myself  any  real  happiness.  Forgive 
me :  I  beg  you'll  believe  it  is  not  in  my  power  to 
avoid  complaining  as  I  do." 

Mere  gratitude  to  the  late  Mrs.  Vanhomrigh  for 
her  kindness  in  the  past  demanded  this  return  from 
her  old  friend.  He  acted  as  it  was  only  possible  to 
act  under  the  circumstances,  and  went  to  the  help  of 
the  two  girls.     It  must  have  been,  however,  with  a 


174  DEAN    SWIFT 

great  deal  of  hesitation,  for  Esther,  a  few  months 
previously,  had  taken  a  step  which  could  only  arouse 
Swift's  anger,  as  it  added  enormously  to  the  difficulties 
of  the  situation.  Her  mother's  death  placed  under 
her  control  a  small  estate  in  Ireland,  and  she  de- 
termined to  live  in  that  country  in  order  to  be  near 
Swift,  and  thus  attempt  to  satisfy  her  miserable  long- 
ing. A  letter  tells  us  that  she  called  on  Swift  at 
Letcombe  on  her  way  to  Ireland,  which  brought 
down  on  her  a  severe  reproof.  While  Esther  Van- 
homrigh  the  woman  rouses  in  us  feelings  of  anger, 
Esther  the  lovesick  and  hysterical  girl  fills  us  with 
the  deepest  pity.  Half  an  hour's  thought  at  this 
juncture  would  have  taught  her  that  she  was  adding 
to  her  own  misery  by  such  a  course,  and  would  have 
made  her  realize  the  impossibility  of  her  passion,  for 
Swift  had  told  her  he  could  not  marry  her ;  but  she 
was  incapable  of  sane  meditation  on  the  subject,  she 
was  desperate.  She  was,  moreover,  without  any 
friend  to  help  her,  for  Swift  hitherto  had  helped  to 
advise  her  in  every  crisis.  She  refused  to  see  that 
the  more  she  saw  of  him  or  talked  with  him  the  more 
her  feelings  suffered.  She  let  herself  go  completely 
and  absolutely,  and  from  this  point  perhaps  we  must 
look  on  her  as  incapable  of  self-control.  We  cannot, 
however,  blame  Swift  for  what  happened,  nor  can  he 
reasonably  be  made  responsible  for  any  part  of  this 
unfortunate  episode  in  his  life.  It  is  useless  to 
generalize,  useless  to  say  that  one  set  of  actions 
will  invariably  fit  one  set  of  circumstances.  Swift 
could  not  have  acted  differently.    Esther  Vanhomrigh 


DON   QUIXOTE  175 

was  physically  weak,  both  she  and  her  sister  died  of 
consumption,  and  this  probably  accounted  for  her 
lack  of  balance.  Swift's  treatment  would  have  met 
with  success  in  many  cases.  It  is  difficult  to  think  of 
any  other  course.  Marriage  with  her,  which  he  had 
given  her  no  reason  to  expect,  would  probably  have 
ended  equally  in  disaster,  for  the  hysterical,  ill- 
balanced  and  jealous  wife  is  a  misery  to  her  husband 
and  all  surrounding  her,  and  there  is  no  justification 
for  the  idea  that  marriage  would  have  changed 
Esther's  character. 

For  nine  years  after  her  appearance  in  Dublin 
Esther's  hopeless  passion  went  on.  Her  removal  to 
Cellbridge  had  apparently  no  effect.  Her  letters 
during  this  time  only  point  to  a  mind  diseased  and 
wholly  given  up  to  the  one  absorbing  object.  In 
1720,  she  writes,  "  Is  it  possible  that  you  will  come 
and  see  me  ?  I  beg  for  God's  sake  you  will :  I  would 
give  the  world  to  see  you  here  (and  Mollkin  would 
be  extremely  happy)."  Referring  to  some  letter  of 
Swift's,  she  says,  "  Tell  me  sincerely,  did  those 
circumstances  crowd  on  you,  or  did  you  recollect 
them  only  to  make  me  happy."  Swift's  assurances 
that  he  writes  as  often  as  he  can,  and  that  he  has 
always  for  her  "the  same  respect,  esteem  and  kind- 
ness "  as  he  has  always  possessed,  are  of  no  avail. 
She  was  at  this  time  weighed  down  by  her  sister's 
illness.  "Judge  what  a  way  I  am  now  in,  absent 
from  you  and  loaded  with  melancholy  on  her  score." 
She  professes  that  she  is  unwilling  to  grieve. 
"  Between  us  it  is  with  the  utmost  regret  that  I  now 


176  DEAN   SWIFT 

complain  to  you,  because  I  know  your  good-nature 
is  such  that  you  cannot  see  any  human  creature 
miserable  without  being  sensibly  touched.  Yet  what 
can  I  do  ?  I  must  either  unload  my  heart  and  tell 
you  all  its  griefs,  or  sink  under  the  inexpressible 
distress  I  now  suffer  by  your  prodigious  neglect  of 
me.  It  is  now  ten  long  weeks  since  I  saw  you  :  and 
in  all  that  time  I  have  never  received  but  one  letter 
from  you  and  a  little  note  with  an  excuse  .  .  .  Put 
my  passion  under  the  utmost  restraint ;  send  me  as 
distant  from  you  as  the  earth  will  allow :  yet  you 
cannot  banish  those  charming  ideas  which  will  ever 
stick  by  me  whilst  I  have  the  use  of  memory  :  nor  is 
the  love  I  bear  you  only  seated  in  my  soul :  for  there 
is  not  a  single  atom  of  my  frame  that  is  not  blended 
with  it,  therefore  do  not  flatter  yourself  that  separa- 
tion will  ever  change  my  sentiments  :  I  find  myself 
unquiet  in  the  midst  of  silence,  and  my  heart  is  at 
once  pierced  with  sorrow  and  love." 

Her  sister's  death  left  Esther  alone  to  brood  over 
her  misery,  which  was  much  aggravated  by  the  report 
of  Swift's  marriage  with  Stella.  Her  last  hope  gone, 
she  determined  to  injure  in  every  way  possible  the 
object  of  her  attachment.  She  cancelled  her  will, 
which  had  been  made  in  favour  of  Swift,  and  then,  as 
the  story  goes,  was  capable  of  a  deed  which  can 
only  condemn  her.  Some  stories  have  it  that  she 
wrote  to  Stella  asking  her  if  she  were  married  to 
Swift,  others  that  she  wrote  to  Swift,  filling  both 
letters  with  abuse.  A  third  story  has  it  that  she 
went  to  see  Stella  to  demand  the  truth  from  her  in 


DON   QUIXOTE  177 

person.     It  is  impossible  to  know  which  contains  the 
truth. 

Whatever  her  action,  Swift's  anger  on  Stella's 
account  was  such  that  he  refused  to  see  Esther  or 
write  to  her  again.  She  died  a  few  months  later  in 
1723,  having  assigned  as  one  duty  to  her  executors 
the  publication  of  Swift's  letters  to  her,  including  the 
poem  "Cadenus  and  Vanessa."  This  last  act  was  of 
course  that  of  a  woman  burning  for  revenge  and 
wishing  at  all  costs  to  injure  the  man  who  had  hurt 
her.  To  those  who  judge  her,  I  recommend  her  to 
mercy,  but  not  to  mercy  at  the  expense  of  the  man 
who  did  not  wrong  her,  and  whose  part  in  the  drama 
was  the  only  possible  part  for  him  to  take.  Only 
one  actor  in  the  story  deserves  pity  ;  Swift  is  capable 
of  defending  himself,  his  life  is  a  sufficient  defence, 
but  on  Stella  the  blow  must  have  fallen  with  no  light 
weight. 

How  far  Stella  knew  the  truth  of  the  story  we 
shall  never  know.  Swift,  who  was  sincere  in  all 
his  dealings  both  with  men  and  women,  would 
certainly  not  have  concealed  his  friendship  with 
Esther  Vanhomrigh  from  the  woman  from  whom 
he  hid  nothing,  with  the  exception  of  political 
matters,  throughout  his  intercourse  with  her.  The 
scarcity  of  the  references  to  her  in  the  Journal 
is  quite  natural.  Probably  out  of  respect  for  the 
younger  woman  he  refrained  from  telling  Stella 
of  her  lack  of  self-control  and  passionate  self- 
surrender.  His  conception  of  a  woman's  character 
would   prevent    him    from    talking    of   it.       Besides 

N 


178  DEAN    SWIFT 

he  knew  such  a  thing  was  only  too  likely  to  become 
exaggerated  in  a  woman's  mind,  and  might  cause 
Stella  unnecessary  annoyance.  Stella  herself  never 
listened  to  gossip  of  any  sort,  and  her  ideals  of 
friendship  would  certainly  lead  her  to  reject  with 
scorn  any  gossip  about  her  greatest  friend.  Thus, 
probably,  the  facts  immediately  surrounding  the 
death  of  Esther  Vanhomrigh  were  a  painful 
revelation  to  her,  but  no  one  can,  with  any  sanity 
of  judgment,  think  that  they  caused  her  to  lose 
her  faith  in  Swift.  She  had  known  Swift  for  more 
than  thirty  years,  and  she  understood  him  perfectly ; 
the  affection  of  a  lifetime  could  not  be  suddenly 
eradicated  by  unkind  gossip.  She  probably  saw 
the  truth  of  the  whole  matter. 

Melodramatic  writers  have  represented  a  most 
tragic  picture  at  this  juncture,  of  Swift  retiring 
for  two  months  to  hide  his  head,  and  of  Stella 
beginning  to  languish  with  a  broken  heart.  That 
he  was  ill  at  the  time  and  much  in  need  of  rest 
we  have  no  doubt,  and  sorrow  for  the  woman  for 
whom  he  had  a  genuine  affection  must  have  made 
him  miserable,  but  surely  there  was  no  occasion 
for  the  tragic  and  sudden  retreat  depicted  by  his 
biographers.  Stella,  moreover,  had  been  ailing  for 
some  time,  she  had  always  been  in  delicate  health, 
and  some  few  years  before  had  begun  probably 
that  slow  decline  which  ended  fatally  in  1728.  She 
was  forty-five  or  six  and  her  father  had  died  before 
he  reached  this  age.  Is  there  any  great  cause  for 
surprise,   therefore,    in   the  death  at   forty-five   of  a 


DON    QUIXOTE  179 

naturally  delicate  woman  ?  There  is  something 
fatally  tragic  for  Swift  in  the  death  of  these  two 
women  within  four  years  of  each  other. 

In  1726  Stella's  failing  health  began  to  cause 
him  the  gravest  anxiety,  and  for  the  next  two  years 
the  thought  of  her  approaching  death  cast  a  deep 
gloom  over  him.  Few  pictures  can  be  sadder  than 
that  of  the  last  two  years  of  Stella's  life.  Death 
contains  an  element  infinitely  more  pathetic  for 
strong  natures  than  for  weaker  ones,  while,  at  the 
same  time,  they  meet  it  more  philosophically  as 
the  end  of  a  struggle.  The  real  tragedy,  however, 
lies  in  this,  that  those  who,  through  natural 
strength  of  character,  have  been  able  to  override 
every  obstacle  and  overcome  every  difficulty,  are 
at  last  confronted  by  an  element  which  they  cannot 
hope  to  alter.  Here  were  two  beings,  both  of 
sufficient  strength  to  make  their  own  lives,  each 
finding  the  other  necessary  to  their  happiness, 
suddenly  confronted  with  the  necessity  of  separa- 
tion. Some  may  talk  of  Stella's  prospect  of  greater 
happiness.  Her  own  vitality  and  moral  strength 
must  have  led  her  to  find  satisfaction  in  life,  there- 
fore, presumably  the  thought  of  death  would  not 
be  one  of  unmitigated  satisfaction.  Swift  looked 
forward  to  years  of  loneliness,  deprived  of  the 
companionship  which  he  felt  necessary  to  his 
existence.  "  I  think,"  he  writes  to  a  friend,  "  that 
there  is  not  a  greater  folly  than  that  of  entering 
into  too  strict  a  partnership  or  friendship  with 
the    loss    of    which    a     man    must    be    absolutely 


i8o  DEAN    SWIFT 

miserable :  but  especially  (when  the  loss  occurs) 
at  an  age  which  is  too  late  to  engage  in  a  new 
friendship."  Perhaps  it  is  the  egoist's  point  of 
view,  but  are  we  not  all  egoists  ?  Can  there  be 
greater  loneliness  than  that  of  a  temperament  which 
finds  no  companionship  save  in  its  exact  comple- 
ment, and  is  therefore  cut  off  entirely  from  others  ? 
This  was  the  loneliness  to  which  Swift  saw  himself 
condemned  by  the  loss  of  the  woman  who  had  saved 
him  from  the  most  terrible  blank  possible.  These 
last  years  were  characteristic  of  their  friendship. 
Swift  expected  Stella  to  find  strength  in  herself 
for  consolation.  He  saw  comparatively  little  of  her, 
the  thought  of  her  loss  v/as  too  terrible  for  him, 
and  thus  she  sank  out  of  his  life.  He  saw  her  four 
days  before  her  death,  then  left  her  and  waited  for 
the  end.  We  will  leave  him  alone  in  his  sorrow, 
to  hear  again  and  again — 

"  the  steps  of  the  bearers,  heavy  and  slow, 
And  the  sobs  of  the  mourners  deep  and  low  ; 
The  weary  sound  and  the  heavy  breath, 
And  the  silent  motions  of  passing  death." 

It  is  enough.     Those  who  understand  Swift  will 
understand  him  now\     Requiescat ! 


DEAN    SWIKT 

KROM    THE    BUST    IN    TRINITY   COLLEGE    LIHRARV,    DUHLIN 


CHAPTER  VI 

THE  POET  AND  MORALIST 

IT  is  impossible  to  separate  the  two  elements  of 
Swift's  genius,  verse  or  satire,  they  are  indis- 
solubly  connected,  for  the  one  is  in  many  cases 
the  medium  of  the  other.  With  Dryden  we  say,  "  Sir, 
you  will  never  be  a  poet,"  and  poet  Swift  could  never  be 
for  many  reasons.  In  his  work  imagination  is  lacking. 
The  imagination  to  be  found  in  "  Gulliver's  Travels  " 
and  the  "Battle  of  the  Books"  is  indeed  but  only 
one  element  of  this  quality.  It  is  not  poetical  imagina-,- 
tion.  In  "  Gulliver's  Travels  "  we  find  the  imagination 
of  the  child  narrator,  and  hence  we  have  the  power- 
ful, almost  inimitable  appeal  to  the  child's  mind.  It 
is  only  the  childlike  mind  which  can  lead  from  one 
impossibility  to  another,  plunge  from  one  manifest 
absurdity  into  another.  Yet  it  believes  in  itself,  it 
has  confidence  in  its  own  plausibility,  and  the 
creations  of  its  own  brain  are  real  to  it.  Nothing 
can  shake  its  belief  in  their  existence.  But  the 
child's  hand  omits  the  twofold  process  required. 
The  child  lifts  one  veil,  the  mist  which  hides  the 
panorama  of  this  wonderful  land,  but  there  it  must 


i82  DEAN   SWIFT 

perforce  withdraw.  The  second  curtain,  which  is 
drawn  between  the  child's  eyes  and 

"  the  blue  far  above  us — so  blue  and  so  far  ! " 

which  shrouds  the  impenetrable  mystery,  and  which 
can  alone  be  lifted  by  the  hand  of  him  whose  touch 
is  sufficiently  reverential,  remains  drawn  before 
the  child's  gaze.  And  here  Swift  and  the  child  are 
at  one. 

It  is  at  this  point  that  Swift's  imagination  stops. 
It  is  here  that  the  poet's  imagination  begins.  No 
one  can  be  a  poet  with  limitations  such  as  Swift 
possessed.  Nor  can  that  man  be  a  poet  whose  claim 
to  poetical  genius  is  based  alone  on  the  powerful  and 
attractive  narration  of  the  absurd.  The  explorer  in 
the  Land  of  Imagination,  he  who  has  no  rest  for  the 
sole  of  his  foot,  must  for  ever  remain  a  traveller,  but 
he  cannot  expect  to  know  the  country  through  which 
he  travels,  nor  to  have  revealed  to  him  its  real  beauty. 
He  does  not  allow  the  sun  of  that  country  to  play 
upon  him,  nor  the  streams  to  lave  his  limbs,  nor  the 
moonbeams  with  their  cool  clear  light  to  refresh  him 
after  the  heat  of  the  day.  He  knows  no  rest  in  that 
land.  Such  is  Swift.  The  poet,  on  the  contrary, 
knows  that  land  as  his  home.  It  is  the  centre  of 
his  aspirations,  it  is  rest  after  the  fulfilment  of  his 
aspirations. 

But  to  none  of  the  early  eighteenth-century  writers 
was  this  revealed.  That  which  was  solely  of  the  spirit, 
if  it  had  ever  been  manifest  to  them,  would  have  been 
held  up  as  a  laughing-stock.    It  was  the  age  of  realism  ; 


THE   POET  AND   MORALIST  183 

of  the  physically  real  as  opposed  to  the  spiritually 
real,  that  which  is  born  of  the  spirit  was  non-existent. 
It  was  an  age  of  morality  without  religion,  of  the 
ideals  of  Rome  rather  than  of  Athens,  and  Swift  was 
of  his  age,  and  lived  for  it,  with  perhaps  a  reaching- 
out  to  something  beyond,  which  has  found  its  fulfil- 
ment in  our  generation.  The  eighteenth  century 
was  "  of  the  earth,  earthy  "  in  its  ideals,  and  "  of  the 
earth,  earthy,"  inasmuch  as  it  formed  the  soil  for  the 
thought  of  the  nineteenth  century.  It  was,  more- 
over, fruitful  soil.  It  was,  and  wished  to  be,  known 
by  its  fruits.  In  this  sense,  it  was  vulgarly  practical. 
It  was  conscious  solely  of  the  tangibla  Other 
elements  were  potential  in  it,  but  as  yet  were  not 
visible.  Herein  we  have  the  key  to  Swift's  verse, 
and  here  we  have  the  reason  of  its  failure  as  poetry. 
Everything  that  he  does  must  have  its  practical  value, 
hence  his  verse  is  satirical.  Satire  has  a  certain 
definite  end  in  view,  a  certain  definite  purpose,  hence 
Swift  adopts  satire  as  a  means  to  his  purpose,  which 
is  the  reform  of  humanity. 

The  poet,  on  the  other  hand,  sings  a  song 
spontaneous  in  its  expression  of  emotion.  It  is  a 
part  of  his  nature,  part  of  himself.  He  writes  that 
he  may  sing.  If  he  teaches,  the  teaching  is  an 
accident.  Conscious  didacticism  is  the  death  of 
poetry.  In  poetry  we  have  the  sunshine  on  the  1 
water ;  in  Swift's  work,  even  at  its  lightest,  we  have 
fire,  the  caricature  of  sunshine,  and  it  crackles  with 
thorns  under  the  pot.  Just  as  work  with  no  "  body" 
in  it  could  have  no  charm  for  Swift,  so  spirituality 


i84  DEAN   SWIFT 

must  be  lacking  in  his  poems.  He  is  a  strange, 
almost  unparalleled  mixture  in  the  human  race.  It 
is,  as  a  rule,  the  spiritual  character  to  which  the  body 
with  all  its  functions  is  so  natural  a  thing  that  it  con- 
siders it  a  mere  accident,  so  much  apart  from  the 
real  self  that  no  action  of  this  body  would  specially 
concern  the  real  character.  In  the  same  way  it  looks 
on  the  bodies  of  other  people.  Hence,  any  reference 
to  this  external  physical  self  is  natural.  This  kind 
of  spirituality  cannot  be  claimed  for  Swift.  He  is 
I  essentially  unspiritual,  essentially  moral  rather  than 
i  spiritual,  and  yet  he  has  this  way  of  looking  at  the 
f  human  body.  He  is  what  we  may  call  the  perfectly 
natural  man.  This  is  shown  in  one  way  by  his 
attitude  to  Nature.  He  makes  no  comment  on  it, 
regards  it  as  a  matter  of  course,  as  an  element  to  be 
taken  for  granted.  There  is  no  poetical  ecstasy  on 
the  subject  of  Nature  in  Swift's  work,  barely  a  men- 
tion of  it.  In  his  letters,  where  it  occurs,  it  is  part 
of  some  practical  advice  to  Stella  not  to  disregard  the 
value  of  exercise  in  the  open  air. 

He  mentions  the  fact  that  the  hedges  are  now 
green  with  the  spring.  This  incidental  mention  of 
Nature  is  practically  the  only  one.  Swift  knows 
nothing  of  the  pseudo-pastoralism  of  the  latter  half 
of  the  century.  If  he  had  known  it  he  would  have 
rejected  it  with  scorn  as  an  element  unworthy  of  the 
consideration  of  a  serious  writer.  He  would  not 
have  appreciated  the  motive  of  writing  about  what 
to  him  did  not  exist.  A  string  of  descriptive  ad- 
jectives   purporting  to    dignify   a  landscape   which, 


THE  POET  AND   MORALIST  185 

beautiful  in  itself,  was  insulted  by  description,  and 
could  only  be  seen  in  its  true  value  by  the  mind 
of  the  poet,  would  have  seemed  to  Swift  merely 
unnecessary  verbiage.  Grandiose  description,  and 
blatantly  unreal  admiration  of  an  artificial  fountain 
placed  in  an  equally  artificial  garden  would  only  have 
called  forth  abuse  from  the  mouth  and  pen  of  so 
sincere  a  writer. 

This  incarnation  of  sincerity  has  a  serious  purpose 
in  view.      Hence  we  have  serious  work.     Satire  in    ; 
the  hands  of  the  natural  man,  with  a  serious  purpose    ) 
in  view,  probably  becomes  a  thing  which  cannot  be  / 
looked    on   with    equanimity    by    the    irresponsibly  / 
nice,    who    like    to    adopt    an    attitude    of   niceness 
which  completely  shuts  out  the  real  state  of  affairs.  \ 
Hence  Swift  has  attained  a  character  for  coarseness.  \ 
A   modern  writer   says,   "  He   had   an   extreme  and 
peculiarly  disagreeable  love  of  the  coarse  and   the 
offensive."    This  is  no  light  charge  to  bring  against 
a  writer  such  as  Swift  (Ainger,  "  Essays  on  Swift's 
Life  and  Genius"),  either  as  writer  or  as  man.     It 
implies  that  Swift's  habit  of  mind  was  coarse,  and  it 
is  due  to  such  light  statement  that  this  is  the  popular 
opinion  held  of  him.     It  is  emphatically  untrue,  and 
it  rests  with  all  who  appreciate  and  therefore  admire 
Swift's   genius   to   refute   these   statements.     Where 
would  a  man's  coarseness  appear  but   in  the  letters 
of  everyday  life  ?    Throughout  the  Journal  to  Stella, 
which  is  the  real  reflection  of  Swift's  mind,  the  mirror 
wherein  he  comes  out  clear  and  undimmed,  there  is 
not    one   coarse   reference,   nothing   which   a  writer 


i86  DEAN   SWIFT 

of  the  ultra  refined  twentieth  century  might  not  have 
written  to  a  friend.  "  But,"  says  the  censor,  "  they 
were  written  to  a  woman,  and  Swift  would  not  have 
insulted  her  by  coarseness."  Again  and  again  we 
are  assured  by  Swift  that  Stella  had  the  mind  of  a 
man.  He  would  not,  therefore,  have  refrained  on 
these  grounds.  Moreover,  she  was  his  constant 
companion,  the  friend  of  every  hour  of  his  life,  bad 
as  well  as  good.  Is  it  likely,  then,  that  he  would 
have  taken  pains  to  restrain  his  conversation  when 
with  her  ?  for  these  letters  are  merely  a  conversation 
carried  on  for  three  years  without  intermission. 
Moreover,  in  Swift's  letters  to  Mr.  Sheridan,  his 
most  intimate  friend,  there  are,  perhaps,  not  more 
than  three  instances  of  coarseness.  Does  this  point 
to  habitual  coarseness?  Judge  him  in  the  light  of 
the  manners  and  habits  of  the  present  day,  leaving 
out  of  the  question  the  habits  of  mind  of  the 
eighteenth  century  and  ask  the  question,  What  man 
or  woman  of  Swift's  age  and  varied  experience  has 
gone  through  life  absolutely  guiltless  of  a  coarse 
expression  or  thought?  So  much  for  the  coarse- 
ness of  Swift  as  a  private  character.  Coarseness 
is  not  habitual  to  him.  Whatever  we  find  in  him 
as  a  private  individual  of  the  element  of  coarseness 
may,  to  a  great  extent,  be  attributed  to  the  spirit 
of  the  century  in  which  he  lived,  when  men,  if  they 
were  lacking  in  refinement,  did  not  take  the  trouble 
to  hide  it  under  the  flimsy  veil  of  innuendo  and 
suggestion. 

Yet  the  charge  against  Swift's  private  character 


THE   POET  AND   MORALIST  187 

would    perhaps   have    been   merged    altogether   had 
not   his  work  as  a  public  character  again   aroused 
the  same  accusation.     The  fact  that  he  is  before  the 
world,  in  the  forefront  of  the  world's  stage,  standing 
in   the   full   blaze  of  the   footlights,  does   not  make 
him  coarser.     It  only  serves,  as  in  the  case  of  other 
public  characters,  to  intensify  any  quality  or  attribute 
which    Swift    happens    to    possess.      There    is    an 
element   in   his   poetry   which   can   only   be   termed 
repulsive.      It  is  realism  carried   to  its  utmost   and  , 
deepest  logical  conclusion,  realism  with  that  depth,  ^ 
that   inner  meaning,  which  in  the  ideal   is  the  sub-1 
lime:  to    use    a    contradiction    in    terms,   it    is    the  t 
sublimity    of   realism.     And,   as    with    every    other  \ 
element,    every    other    attribute    of    Swift's    work,  j 
it   is   there   with   its   own  definite   serious   purpose.) 
Perhaps   to  admirers  of  Swift's  life  and   genius  the 
knowledge  of  this  horrible  capacity  comes  with  an 
unpleasant  surprise.     They  are  accustomed  to  look 
on   him   as   the   ascetic,   the   man   of  moderation,   a 
character   whose  strong  self-control  never  lets  him 
shrink   from    the   great    principles  which    form    the 
guiding-line  of  his  life.      In  his  use  of  this  element 
he  has  not  relaxed  this  control.     It  has  been  proved 
that  repulsiveness  is  not  a  habit  of  his  mind.  , 

We  can,  perhaps,  trace  four  reasons  for  Swift's 
use  of  such  an  element  in  his  work,  though  three  \ 
can  be  at  best  only  problematical.  He  is  frequently 
at  a  loss  for  a  rhyme,  and  interposes  some  coarse 
word  or  thought;  sometimes  a  slight  thought  when 
worked    out    to    its    conclusion    becomes    intensely 


i88  DEAN   SWIFT 

coarse,  but  yet  he  cannot  refrain  from  following  up 
^^       the   train    he  has   already   started ;  thirdly,  he   uses 
<Cj'      this  element  simply  in  a  spirit  of  mockery,  knowing 
that  the   superlatively   nice   will   start   back  with   a 
look  of  horror,  and  he  rejoices  in  the  fact  that   he 
can  cause  this,  for  Swift   is  always  sincere,  and   he 
knows  only  too  well  that  superlative  niceness  means 
nothing,    or  rather,   that    it   means   an    absence    of 
naturalness  which  will  frequently  put  a  bad  construc- 
tion on  what  is  good  and  innocent.     He  is  a  master 
in  the  science  of  human  nature. 
^    .  But  his  last  reason  is  the  most  important.     He  is 

'^^^  fully  aware  of  the  lack  of  refinement  in  the  society  of 

ri  the  day.  He  knows  only  too  well  that  where  we 
J ,  should  look  for  refinement  of  manners,  etc.,  we  can 
i  only  find  coarseness  and  the  absence  of  all  beauty  of 
i  nature.  He  knows  that  behind  the  gorgeous  attire 
of  the  middle-aged,  the  simpering  elegance  of  the 
young  lady,  the  fastidious  niceness  of  the  youth, 
there  is  vice  and  corruption.  He  knows  that 
pedantry  is  a  cloak  for  a  neglect  of  duty,  that  a 
superfluity  of  piety  is  a  disguise  for  every  form  of 
evil.  He  is  aware,  too,  that  the  apparently  evil  is 
frequently  the  really  good.  He  is,  moreover,  deter- 
mined to  tear  off  this  cloak  of  affectation,  and  to  show 
up  the  realities  of  life.  But  he  knows  that  the 
exhibition  of  unreality  will  not  be  enough.  Realities 
are  present  with  us  every  day,  and  they  arouse  no 
wonder  or  pity.  He  must  have  more  than  this.  He 
will  work  out  to  their  utmost  conclusion,  in  all  the 
bitterness    of   truth    the    unutterable   horror  of   the 


r 


THE   POET  AND   MORALIST  189 

tendencies  to  evil  in  human  nature.  No  one  knew  / 
better  than  Swift  what  they  were.  That  man  who  I 
has  trained  himself  to  a  habit  of  asceticism  knows 
to  the  full  the  terrible  capacity  for  evil  in  his  own 
nature,  and  the  need  of  a  bitter  struggle  against  it ; 
he  knows,  too,  that  only  by  the  conquest  of  it  in  him- 
self can  he  possibly  help  others  to  overcome  it.  This 
is  Swift's  self-appointed  task.  By  rendering  more 
horrible  the  evil  in  human  nature  he  will  cure  it. 
To  the  ignorant,  to  those  who  perhaps  do  not  wish  to 
understand  his  true  motive,  he  has  done  this  at  the 
expense  of  his  own  character,  his  own  reputation  for 
decency.  We  are  told,  "  He  has  conceived  the  awful 
idea  of  cursing  the  very  image  of  his  Maker;  hooting 
and  yelling  at  the  flesh  and  blood  which  he,  the 
author,  was  himself  compelled  to  wear."  There  is  no 
answer  to  this  kind  of  criticism,  but  direction  to  the 
author  thereof  to  read  mark  learn  and  inwardly  digest 
the  words  and  opinions  of  the  writer  at  whom  he 
scoffs.  We  will  not  ask  this  writer,  and  others  like 
him,  to  take  Swift  off  the  dunghill  on  which  they  have 
placed  him,  nor  to  scrape  off  the  mud  with  which  they 
have  adorned  the  greatest  ornament  of  the  eighteenth 
century.  Let  them  only  realize  that  Swift  w^as,  per- 
haps, the  one  frequenter  of  the  Court  in  his  century 
in  whose  presence  no  coarse  language,  no  question- 
able jest,  was  allowed  to  be  uttered.  If  such  a  thing 
happened,  it  happened  at  the  expense  of  the  depriva- 
tion of  his  company  and  brilliant  wit,  of  which  no  one 
wished  to  be  deprived. 

Let   them  consider,  too,  the  fact  that  throughout 


I90  DEAN   SWIFT 

Swift's  work  there  is  no  vestige  of  immorality— by 
immorality  I  mean  anything  which  can  be  termed 
a  breach  of  order.  Compare  him  with  the  dramatists 
immediately  preceding  and  contemporary  with  him. 
Here  we  find  unadulterated  immorality  purely  for 
the  sake  of  pleasure,  not  an  attempt  to  expose  it 
through  realistic  representation.  In  them  it  is 
recognized  as  a  legitimate  and  profitable  source  of 
amusement.  For  this  practice  Swift  cannot  find 
reproof  strong  enough.  He  refers  to  it  several 
times  in  words  of  strong  condemnation.  It  receives 
the  bitterest  attack  of  all  in  "  Gulliver's  Travels.  "  A 
satirical  attack  with  intensely  serious  meaning  is 
made  in  "  Polite  Conversation." 

This  work,  in  which  the  Introduction  is  the 
valuable  asset,  for  the  dramatic  dialogue  is  merely 
a  list  of  examples  of  the  conversation  in  vogue 
among  "polite"  circles  of  the  day,  is  perhaps  meant 
to  be  an  attack  on  what  are  termed  the  slighter 
defects  in  Society,  which  to  Swift,  as  to  other 
observers,  arise  from  defects  of  character,  and  while 
they  are  manifested  in  individuals,  reflect  the  moral 
condition  of  the  class  taken  as  a  whole.  "I  have 
likewise,  for  some  reasons  of  equal  weight,  been 
very  sparing  in  double  entendres :  because  they 
often  put  ladies  upon  affected  constraints  and  affected 
ignorance.  In  short,  they  break,  or  very  much 
entangle,  the  thread  of  discourse :  neither  am  I 
master  of  any  rules  to  settle  the  disconcerted 
countenances  of  the  females  in  such  a  juncture  :  I 
can  therefore  only  allow  innuendoes  of  this  kind  to 


THE   POET  AND   MORALIST  191 

be  delivered  in  whispers,  and  only  to  young  ladies 
under  twenty,  who  being  in  honour  obliged  to 
blush,  it  may  produce  a  new  subject  for  discourse." 

Again,  on  the  use  of  exaggerated  language,  he  is 
equally  discerning.  "  Perhaps  the  critics  may  accuse 
me  of  a  defect  in  my  following  system  of  *  Polite 
Conversation':  that  there  is  one  great  ornament  of 
discourse  whereof  I  have  not  produced  a  single 
example.  .  .  .  The  defect  I  mean  is,  my  not  having 
inserted  into  the  body  of  my  book  all  the  oaths 
now  most  in  fashion  for  embellishing  discourse, 
especially  since  it  could  give  no  offence  to  the  clergy, 
who  are  seldom  or  never  admitted  to  these  polite 
assemblies.  And  it  must  be  allowed  that  oaths  well 
chosen  are  not  only  very  useful  expletives  to  matter, 
but  great  ornaments  of  style. 

"  What  I  shall  here  offer  in  my  own  defence  upon 
this  important  article  will,  I  hope,  be  some  extenua- 
tion of  my  fault, 

"  First,  I  reasoned  with  myself,  that  a  just  collection 
of  oaths,  repeated  as  often  as  the  fashion  requires, 
must  have  enlarged  this  volume  at  least  to  double  the 
bulk ;  whereby  it  would  not  only  double  the  charge, 
but  likewise  make  the  volume  less  commodious  for 
pocket  carriage. 

"  Secondly,  I  have  been  assured  by  some  judicious 
friends  that  themselves  have  known  certain  ladies  to 
take  offence  (whether  seriously  or  not)  at  too  great 
'  profusion  of  cursing  and  swearing,'  even  when 
that  kind  of  ornament  was  not  improperly  introduced  ; 
which,  I  confess,  did  startle  me   not  a  little,  having 


192  DEAN   SWIFT 

never  observed  the  like  in  the  compass  of  my  own 
several  acquaintance,  at  least  for  twenty  years  past. 
However,  I  was  forced  to  submit  to  wiser  judgment 
than  my  own. 

"  Thirdly,  as  this  most  useful  treatise  is  calculated 
for  all  future  times,  I  considered,  in  this  maturity  of 
my  age,  how  great  a  variety  of  oaths  I  have  heard 
since  I  began  to  study  the  world,  and  to  know  men 
and  manners.  And  here  I  found  it  to  be  true,  what  I 
have  read  in  an  ancient  poet — 

'  For  nowadays  men  change  their  oathes, 
As  often  as  they  change  their  clothes.' 

"  In  short,  oaths  are  the  children  of  fashion  ;  they 
are  in  some  sense  almost  annuals,  like  what  I  observed 
before  of  cant  words,  and  I  myself  can  remember 
some  forty  different  sets.  The  old  stock  oaths,  I  am 
confident,  do  not  amount  to  above  forty-five  or  fifty 
at  most ;  but  the  way  of  mingling  and  compounding 
them  is  almost  as  various  as  that  of  the  alphabet.  .  .  . 

"The  flowers  of  wit,  fancy,  wisdom,  humour,  and 
politeness,  scattered  in  this  volume,  amount  to  one 
thousand  and  seventy  four.  Allowing  to  every 
gentleman  and  lady  thirty  visiting  families  (not 
insisting  upon  fractions)  there  will  want  but  a  little 
of  a  hundred  polite  questions,  answers,  replies, 
rejoinders,  repartees,  and  remarks,  to  be  daily 
delivered  fresh  in  every  company  for  twelve  solar 
months ;  and  even  this  is  a  higher  pitch  of  delicacy 
than  the  world  insists  on,  or  has  reason  to  expect. 
But  I  am  altogether  for  exalting  this  science  to  its 
utmost  perfection." 


THE  POET  AND   MORALIST  193 

He  throws  an  interesting  light  on  the  amusements 
of  the  day.  "  Play,"  he  says,  "  is  supported  upon  the 
two  great  pillars  of  deliberation  and  action.  The 
terms  of  art  are  few,  prescribed  by  law  and  custom ; 
no  time  allowed  for  digressions  or  trials  of  wit. 
Quadrille,  in  particular,  bears  some  resemblance  to  a 
state  of  nature,  which  we  are  told  is  a  state  of  war  ; 
wherein  every  woman  is  against  every  woman,  the 
unions  short,  inconstant,  and  soon  broke ;  the  league 
made  this  minute  without  knowing  the  ally,  and 
dissolved  in  the  next.  Thus,  at  the  game  of  quadrille, 
female  brains  are  always  employed  in  stratagem,  or 
their  hands  in  action.  Neither  can  we  find  that  our 
art  has  gained  much  by  the  happy  revival  of 
masquerading  among  us,  the  whole  dialogue  in  these 
meetings  being  summed  up  in  one  (sprightly,  I 
confess,  but)  single  question,  and  as  sprightly  an 
answer.  '  Do  you  know  me  ? '  *  Yes,  I  do.'  And 
'Do  you  know  me?'  'Yes,  I  do.'  For  this  reason 
I  did  not  think  it  proper  to  give  my  readers  the 
trouble  of  introducing  a  masquerade  merely  for  the 
sake  of  a  single  question,  and  a  single  answer; 
especially  when  to  perform  them  in  a  proper  manner, 
I  must  have  brought  in  a  hundred  persons  together 
of  both  sexes,  dressed  in  fantastic  habits  for  one 
minute,  and  dismiss  them  the  next. 

"Neither  is  it  reasonable  to  conceive  that  our 
science  can  be  much  improved  by  masquerades, 
where  the  wit  of  both  sexes  is  altogether  broken 
up  in  contriving  singular  and  humorous  disguises ; 
and   their  thoughts   entirely   employed   in    bringing 


194  DEAN   SWIFT 

intrigues  and  assignations  of  gallantry  to  a  happy 
conclusion." 

His  verse,  apart  from  its  value  as  satire  and  the 
light  it  throws  on  the  customs  of  the  day,  need  not  be 
considered  at  great  length  as  compared  with  the  rest 
of  his  work.  It  forms  an  excellent  example  of  the 
versification  of  the  day ;  it  is  essentially  classical  in 
character,  metrically  correct,  rhyme  and  rhythm  may 
be  judged  by  the  severest  standard. 

It  bears,  in  fact,  strong  testimony  to  the  character 
of  the  man  ;  it  is  controlled  and  severe  in  treatment. 

Some  slight  proportion  of  it  is  autobiographical  in 
character,  and  is  hence  valuable,  especially  that  which 
deals  with  his  relations  with  Stella  and  the  trouble  in 
Ireland.  Other  pieces  are  portraits.  One  of  these, 
entitled  Traulus,  is  excellent ;  it  may  be  added  to  the 
series  of  eighteenth-century  portraits  handed  down 
by  Pope,  Addison,  and  others. 

"  Positive  and  overbearing 
Changing  still  and  still  adhering  ; 
Spiteful,  peevish  and  untoward 
Fierce  in  tongue,  in  heart  a  coward. 
When  his  friends  he  most  is  hard  on 
Cringing  comes  to  beg  their  pardon  ; 
Reputation  ever  tearing, 
Ever  dearest  friendship  swearing, 
Judgment  weak  and  passion  strong 
Always  various,  always  wrong  : 
Provocation  never  waits 
Where  he  loves  or  where  he  hates, 
Talks  whate'er  comes  in  his  head, 
Wishes  it  were  all  unsaid. 
Let  me  now  the  vices  trace 
From  the  father's  scoundrel  race  ; 
Who  could  give  the  booby  such  airs 
Were  they  masons,  were  they  butchers  ? 


THE   POET  AND   MORALIST  195 

Herald  lend  the  Muse  an  answer, 
From  his  atavus  and  grandsire. 
This  was  dexterous  at  his  trowel, 
That  was  bred  to  kill  a  cow  well ; 
Hence  the  greasy  clumsy  mien 
In  his  dress  and  figure  seen  ; 
Hence  the  mean  and  sordid  soul, 
Like  his  body  rank  and  foul  ; 
Hence  that  wild  suspicious  peep, 
Like  a  rogue  that  steals  a  sheep  ; 
Hence  he  learnt  the  butcher's  guile 
How  to  cut  your  throat  and  smile  ; 
Like  a  butcher  doom'd  for  life, 
In  his  mouth  to  wear  his  knife. 
Hence  he  draws  his  daily  food 
From  his  tenant's  vital  blood." 

Other  elements  of  his  metrical  work,  all  in  the 
lighter  vein,  are  found  in  the  epigrams  and  riddles, 
which  are  very  humorous  in  subject,  and  bear  the 
same  marks  of  restraint  in  metre  and  construction. 

Beyond  this.  Swift's  satire  must  be  sought  in  his 
prose  works.     Here  we  have  the  Satirist  at  his  best. 
His   prose  is  marked  by  the   same   characteristic  of  / 
self-restraint.       Clear,    concise    sentences,    in   which 
every  word  has  its  full  value.  ^ 

Throughout  English  satire  the  two  essentially 
classical  modes  have  been  retained ;  the  humorous 
kindly  type  of  which  Horace  was  the  exponent,  and  \  r-^ 
the  scathing,  bitter  invective  by  which  Juvenal  hoped  1 
to  resuscitate  the  men  and  morals  of  his  time.  In 
Mediaeval  times  Chaucer  and  Langland  reproduced 
the  methods  of  these  two  writers.  After  this  time 
there  is  no  striking  figure  on  the  stage  of  satiric 
display  until  we  come  to  Elizabethan  satire.  Here 
the  exponents  of  the  grave  and  gay  are  Nash  who,  in 


196  DEAN    SWIFT 

Pierce  Pennilesse's  "Supplication  to  the  Devil,"  closely 
imitates  Juvenal's  earlier  satires;  and  Bishop  Hall, 
v^;ho  writes  in  familiar  commentary  on  men  and 
manners  after  the  manner  of  Horace. 

After  them  come  in  close  succession  Marston,  and 
of  inferior  merit  as  satirists  Nash,  whose  works  show 
a  certain  vitriolic  bitterness.  Donne  of  the  meta- 
physical order,  Dekker,  who  lacked  discrimination, 
Jonson  with  his  sledge-hammer,  and  Chapman,  who 
showed  personal  spite  and  malevolence.  During  the 
Parliamentary  war  satire  became  a  medium  for 
Sectarian  bitterness,  and  degenerated  into  the  instinct 
of  partisan  antagonism.  The  exponents  of  the  satire 
of  this  time  were  Marvell,  Waller,  Cowley,  Oldham, 
Cleveland,  and  Butler,  all  varying  in  type  from 
Horace  to  Juvenal.  Of  Butler  it  can  only  be  said  that 
there  is  little  real  satire  in  his  work.  He  is  a  gay 
comedian,  rousing  laughter  by  his  parlour  tricks  and 
extravagant  humour;  and  occasionally  he  becomes 
the  satirist,  but  this  line  of  work  does  not  meet  with 
much  favour  in  his  eyes,  nor  is  it  the  work  best  suited 
to  his  capacity. 

Dryden  is  the  great  satirist  of  this  time,  and  he 
has  adapted  to  his  use  many  forms  of  satire  the 
elements  of  which  he  probably  found  in  embryo  in  the 
work  of  his  predecessors,  for  even  though  in  this 
branch  of  work  a  great  originality  is  needed,  it  is 
impossible  to  think  of  Dryden  as  the  possessor  of 
such  an  element.  His  great  contribution  to  this 
branch  of  literature  lay  in  this,  that  he  formulated  and 
systematized  for  English  literature  four  distinct  types 


THE   POET  AND   MORALIST  197 

of  satire.  The  first  of  these  is  "Absalom  and  Achi- 
tophel,"  in  which  a  historic  parallel  is  applied  to  the 
impeachment  of  the  vices  and  abuses  of  the  age;  the 
Medal  reverts  to  the  rhetorical  style  so  frequently 
found  in  Juvenilian  satire;  MacFlecknoe  is  the  in- 
dividual and  personal  type  recurring  to  the  style  of 
Hudibras ;  the  "Hind  and  the  Panther"  is  a  new 
development  of  the  satiric  fable.  Herein  lies  Dryden's 
greatest  value,  he  gave  to  British  satire  the  impulse 
towards  that  final  form  of  development  which  it 
received  from  the  great  satirists  of  the  next  century. 
Swift's  three  greatest  satires  are  the  "  Tale  of  a  Tub," 
the  "Battle  of  the  Books,"  and  "Gulliver's  Travels." 
These  must  be  treated  at  some  length,  as  they  con- 
stitute the  work  by  which  he  has  become  more  than  a 
name  to  the  general  public,  but  on  these  alone  can 
Swift  base  his  claim  to  people's  affections.  Here 
he  is  beloved  by  young  and  old  alike.  The  great 
traveller  into  the  unknown  land  pipes  a  wonderful 
story,  and  is  followed  by  a  host  of  tiny  people  who 
show  no  fear,  but  rather  an  enthusiastic  delight  as 
they  enter  the  portals  of  Lilliput  in  close  pursuit  of 
the  wonderful  musician.  Nor  are  they  all  in  their 
childhood.  Old  as  well  as  young  follow  in  hot 
pursuit.  Without  incurring  the  reproach  of  a  lack  of 
seriousness,  for  here  they  can  find  also  a  serious 
import,  they  enter  on  the  Fairyland  and  find  marvels 
of  which  they  never  even  dreamt  before.  Perhaps 
nothing  has  ever  equalled  or  will  ever  equal 
"  Gulliver's  Travels  "  in  its  appeal  to  old  and  young 
alike.      It   comes    almost   at  the   end  of  his   career. 


I9S  DEAN   SWIFT 

it  is  the  swan  song,  it  is  the  greatest  work  he  ever 
produced. 

The  "Tale  of  a  Tub"  does  not  enter  the  land  of 
marvels.  It  is  satire  pure  and  simple.  It  is  a 
strangely  rambling  discourse  in  which  two  definite 
threads  occur.  The  one  is  literary  satire,  which 
takes  the  form  of  digressions ;  the  other  is  a  satire 
on  the  Church.  The  literary  satire  is  really  the 
more  valuable,  partly  because  it  is  universally  true. 

In  reading  the  "  Tale  of  a  Tub  "  we  are  irresistibly 
reminded  of  a  rough-shod   pony  galloping,  trotting, 
or  what  it  will,  over  country  at  the  sight  of  which 
the   more   decorous   steed   stands   aghast.      It  is   as 
though  we  were  jumping  helter  skelter,  now  rising 
into   the  air,  now   falling   heavily,  now   rebounding, 
everything  must  feel  the  imprint  of  our  unresisting 
unrestrained  feet.     The  exuberance  of  youth  is  here, 
unrestrained  by  bit  or  bridle,  embittered  by  contin- 
uous and  unceasing  application  of  the  curb,  of  youth 
bleeding  under  the  merciless  use  of  Fortune's  spur, 
yet  withal  driven  on  to  greater  effort.      Savage  and 
uncontrolled,  refusing  to  see  jest  in  the  humour  of 
Fortune,  ready  to  pull  to  its  lowest  depths,  to  reveal 
in   all    its    internal    blackness,   the   white   sepulchre 
of  human  institutions,  yet  ignorant  of  the  inevitable 
result    of    such    a    course    of    action.      The    bitter 
pessimism    of   youth    aims   at    every    weakness,   at 
every    corruption.      Yet    it    is   optimism,   bare    and 
crude,  without  the  philosophic  intuition  into  realities 
which   advanced   age   brings  with   it.     In   it   we  see 
a   strong   belief   in   those   very   institutions,   a   faith 


THE   POET   AND    MORALIST  199 

which  asserts  again  and  again  that  it  attacks  merely 
the  abuses.  There  is  a  certain  mature  discernment 
which  penetrates  the  excrescences  to  find  the  ster- 
ling worth  beneath,  and  which  avoids  the  fault,  so 
generally  found  in  early  work,  of  indiscriminating 
confusion  between  use  and  abuse.  This  mature 
discernment,  moreover,  allows  him  to  know  wherein 
he  may  have  offended. 

He  introduces  his  work  in  the  following  manner  : — 
"  The  greatest  part  of  that  book  was  finished  above 
thirteen  years  since  in  1696,  which  is  eight  years 
before  it  was  published.  The  author  was  then 
young,  his  invention  at  the  height,  and  his  reading 
fresh  in  his  head.  By  the  assistance  of  some  think- 
ing, and  much  conversation,  he  had  endeavoured 
to  strip  himself  of  as  many  real  prejudices  as 
he  could  :  I  say  real  ones,  because  under  the 
notion  of  prejudices,  he  knew  to  what  dangerous 
heights  some  men  have  proceeded.  Thus  pre- 
pared, he  thought  the  numerous  and  gross  cor- 
ruptions in  Religion  and  Learning  might  furnish 
matter  for  a  satire,  that  would  be  useful  and  divert- 
ing. He  resolved  to  proceed  in  a  manner  that 
should  be  altogether  new,  the  world  having  been 
already  too  long  nauseated  with  endless  repetitions 
on  every  subject.  The  abuses  in  Religion,  he 
proposed  to  set  forth  in  the  Allegory  of  the  Coats, 
and  the  three  Brothers,  which  was  to  make  up  the 
body  of  the  discourse.  Those  in  learning,  he  chose 
to  introduce  by  way  of  digression.  He  was  then  a 
young  gentleman  much  in  the  world,   and  wrote  to 


200  DEAN   SWIFT 

the  taste  of  those  who  were  like  himself;  therefore, 
in  order  to  allure  them,  he  gave  a  liberty  to  his 
pen,  which  might  not  suit  with  maturer  years,  or 
graver  characters,  and  which  he  could  have  easily 
corrected  with  a  very  few  blots  had  he  been 
master  of  his  papers  for  a  year  or  two  before  their 
publication. 

"  Not  that  he  would  have  governed  his  judgment 
by  the  ill-placed  cavils  of  the  sour,  the  envious,  the 
stupid,  and  the  tasteless  which  he  mentions  with 
disdain.  He  acknowledges  there  are  several  youthful 
sallies  which  from  the  grave  and  wise  may  deserve 
a  rebuke.  But  he  desires  to  be  answerable  no 
further  than  he  is  guilty,  and  that  his  faults  may 
not  be  multiplied  by  the  ignorant,  the  unnatural,  aijid 
uncharitable  application  of  those  who  have  neither 
candour  to  suppose  good  meanings,  nor  palate 
to  distinguish  true  ones.  After  which,  he  will  forfeit 
his  life,  if  any  one  opinion  can  be  fairly  deduced 
from  that  book,  which  is  contrary  to  Religion  or 
Morality. 

"Why  should  any  clergyman  of  our  Church  be 
angry  to  see  the  follies  and  fanaticism  and  supersti- 
tion exposed,  though  in  the  most  ridiculous  manner; 
since  that  is,  perhaps,  the  most  probable  way 
to  cure  them,  or  at  least  to  hinder  them  from 
further  spreading?  Besides,  though  it  was  not 
intended  for  their  perusal,  it  rallies  nothing  but 
what  they  preach  against.  It  contains  nothing  to 
provoke  them,  by  the  least  scurrility  upon  their 
persons    and     their    functions.      It     celebrates    the 


THE   POET  AND   MORALIST  201 

Church  of  England,  as  the  most  perfect  of  all  others 
in  discipline  and  doctrine;  it  advances  no  opinion 
they  reject,  nor  condemns  any  they  receive.  If  the 
clergy's  resentment  hang  upon  their  hands,  in  my 
humble  opinion  they  might  have  found  more  proper 
objects  to  employ  them  on ;  nondum  tibi  defuit 
hostis ;  1  mean  those  heavy,  illiterate  scribblers, 
prostitute  in  their  reputation,  vicious  in  their  lives, 
and  ruined  in  their  fortunes,  who,  to  the  shame  of 
good  sense  as  well  as  piety,  are  greedily  read,  merely 
upon  the  strength  of  bold,  false,  impious  assertions, 
mixed  with  unmannerly  reflections  upon  the  priest- 
hood, and  openly  intended  against  all  religions  ;  in 
short,  full  of  such  principles  as  are  kindly  received, 
because  they  are  levelled  to  remove  those  terrors, 
that  Religion  tells  men  will  be  the  consequence  of 
immoral  lives.  Nothing  like  which  is  to  be  met 
with  in  this  discourse,  though  some  of  them  are 
pleased  so  freely  to  censure  it.  And  I  wish  there 
were  no  other  instances  of  what  I  have  too  frequently 
observed,  that  many  of  that  reverend  body  are  not 
always  very  nice  in  distinguishing  between  their 
enemies  and  their  friends." 

It  is  here  where  the  genuine  optimism  of  the 
writer  is  to  be  found.  In  spite  of  his  persistent 
declaration  that  humanity  is  corrupt,  yet  he  demands 
in  the  human  race  a  far  greater  degree  of  dis- 
interested love  of  mankind,  than  has  ever  been  found 
by  those  who  look  for  it.  Here,  again,  we  find  the 
key  to  the  writer's  character,  unhappy  from  the 
world's    point    of  view,  unhappy    because   his    love 


202  DEAN   SWIFT 

of  humanity  is  disinterested  enough  and  blind 
enough  to  lead  him  astray,  so  the  world  has  it,  into 
principles  of  action,  which,  for  a  man  who  was 
"much  in  the  world,"  could  only  lead  to  chaos  and 
ruin. 

"Though  I  have  been  hitherto  as  cautious  as 
I  could,  upon  all  occasions,  most  nicely  to  follow 
the  rules  and  methods  of  writing  laid  down 
by  the  example  of  our  illustrious  moderns,  yet  has 
the  unhappy  shortness  of  my  memory  led  me  into 
an  error,  from  which  I  must  extricate  myself 
before  I  can  decently  pursue  my  principal  subject. 
I  confess,  with  shame,  it  was  an  unpardonable 
omission  to  proceed  so  far  as  I  have  already  done, 
before  I  had  performed  the  due  discourses  expostu- 
latory,  supplicatory,  or  deprecatory,  with  my  good 
lords  the  critics.  Towards  some  atonement  for 
this  grievous  neglect,  I  do  here  make  humbly  bold, 
to  present  them  with  a  short  account  of  themselves, 
and  their  art,  by  looking  into  the  original  and 
pedigree  of  the  word,  as  it  is  generally  understood 
among  us,  and  very  briefly  considering  the  ancient 
and  present  state  thereof. 

"  By  the  word  critic,  at  this  day  so  frequent  in 
all  conversations,  there  have  sometimes  been  dis- 
tinguished three  very  different  species  of  mortal 
men,  according  as  I  have  read  in  ancient  books  and 
pamphlets.  For  first,  by  this  term  was  understood 
such  persons  as  invented  or  drew  up  rules  for 
themselves  and  the  world,  by  observing  which,  a 
careful   reader   might    be   able    to    pronounce    upon 


THE   POET   AND   MORALIST  203 

the  productions  of  the  learned,  from  his  taste  to  a 
true  relish  of  the  sublime  and  the  admirable,  and 
divide  every  beauty  of  matter,  every  style,  from 
the  corruption  that  apes  it. 

"In  their  common  perusal  of  books,  singling  out 
the  errors  and  defects,  the  nauseous,  the  fulsome, 
the  dull,  and  the  impertinent,  with  the  caution  of  a 
man  that  walks  through  Edinburgh  streets  in  a 
morning,  who  is  indeed  as  careful  as  he  can  to 
watch  diligently,  and  spy  out  the  filth  in  his 
way.  .  .  .  These  may  seem,  though  very  erroneously, 
to  have  understood  the  appellation  of  critic  in  a 
literal  sense ;  that  one  principal  part  of  his  office 
was  to  praise  and  acquit,  and  that  a  critic,  who  sets 
up  to  read  only  for  an  occasion  of  censure  and 
reproof,  is  a  creature  as  barbarous  as  a  judge,  who 
should  take  up  a  resolution  to  hang  all  men  that 
came  before  him  upon  trial. 

"  Again,  by  the  word  critic  have  been  meant  the 
restorers  of  ancient  learning  from  the  worms  and 
graves  and  dust  of  manuscripts. 

"Now,  the  vices  of  these  two  have  been  for 
some  ages  utterly  extinct;  and  besides,  to  discourse 
any  further  of  them,  would  not  be  at  all  to  my 
purpose. 

"The  third  and  noblest  sort  is  that  of  the  True 
Critic,  whose  original  is  the  most  ancient  of  all. 
Every  true  critic  is  a  hero  born,  descending  in  a 
direct  line  from  a  celestial  stem  by  Momus  and 
Hybris,  who  begat  Zoilus,  who  begat  Tigellius,  who 
begat    Etcaetera    the  elder,  who   begat    Bentley,  and 


204  DEAN   SWIFT 

Rymer,  and  Wotton,  and  Perrault,  and  Dennis,  who 
begat  Etcaetera  the  younger. 

"  And  these  are  the  critics  from  whom  the 
commonwealth  of  learning  has  in  all  ages  received 
such  immense  benefits,  that  the  gratitude  of  their  ad- 
mirers placed  their  origin  in  Heaven,  among  those  of 
Hercules,  Theseus,  Perseus  and  other  great  deservers 
of  mankind.  But  heroic  virtue  itself,  hath  not  been 
exempt  from  the  obloquy  of  evil  tongues.  For  it 
hath  been  objected  that  those  ancient  heroes,  famous 
for  their  combating  so  many  giants  and  dragons  and 
robbers,  were  in  their  own  persons  a  greater 
nuisance  to  mankind  than  any  of  those  monsters 
they  subdued ;  and  therefore  to  render  their  obliga- 
tions more  complete,  when  all  other  vermin  were 
destroyed,  should  in  conscience  have  concluded 
with  the  same  justice  upon  themselves.  Hercules 
most  generously  did,  and  hath  upon  that  score 
procured  to  himself  more  temples  and  votaries  than 
the  best  of  his  fellows.  For  these  reasons  I 
suppose  it  is  why  some  have  conceived,  it  would 
be  very  expedient  for  the  public  good  of  learning, 
that  every  true  critic,  as  soon  as  he  had  finished  his 
task  assigned,  should  immediately  deliver  himself  up 
to  ratsbane  or  hemp  or  leap  from  some  convenient 
altitude ;  and  that  no  man's  pretensions  to  so 
illustrious  a  character  should  by  any  means  be 
received  before  that  operation  were  performed. 

"Now,  from  this  heavenly  descent  of  criticism, 
and  the  close  analogy  it  bears  to  heroic  virtue,  it 
is  easy  to  assign  the  proper  employment  of  a  true. 


THE   POET  AND   MORALIST  205 

ancient,  genuine  critic,  which  is  to  travel  through  this 
vast  world  of  writings ;  to  pursue  and  hunt  those 
monstrous  faults  bred  within  them  ;  to  drag  out  the 
lurking  errors,  like  Cacus  from  his  den  ;  to  multiply 
them  like  Hydra's  heads,  and  rake  them  together 
like  Augeas'  dung,  or  else  drive  away  a  sort  of 
dangerous  fowl,  who  have  a  perverse  inclination  to 
plunder  the  best  branches  of  the  tree  of  knowledge, 
like  those  Stymphalian  birds  that  eat  up  the  fruit." 

The  Tale  is  slight  as  narrative,  and  consists  of  the 
adventures  of  the  three  brothers  Peter,  Martin  and 
Jack  to  each  of  whom  the  father  left  as  sole  legacy  a 
new  coat  with  these  instructions :  "  Now  you  are  to 
understand,  that  these  coats  have  two  virtues  con- 
tained in  them  :  one  is,  that  with  good  wearing  they 
will  last  you  fresh  and  sound  as  long  as  you  live  :  the 
other  is  that  they  will  grow  in  the  same  proportion 
with  your  bodies,  lengthening  and  widening  of  them- 
selves, so  as  to  be  always  fit.  Here,  let  me  see  them 
on  you  before  I  die.  So  :  very  well,  pray  children, 
wear  them  clean,  and  brush  them  often.  You  will 
find  in  my  will  full  instructions  in  every  particular 
concerning  the  wearing  and  management  of  your 
coats ;  wherein  you  must  be  very  exact,  to  avoid  the 
penalties,  I  have  appointed  for  every  transgression 
or  neglect,  upon  which  your  future  fortunes  will 
entirely  depend.  I  have  also  commanded  in  my  will, 
that  you  should  live  together  in  my  house  like 
brethren  and  friends,  for  then  you  will  be  sure  to 
thrive  and  not  otherwise." 


206  DEAN   SWIFT 

Shortly  afterwards  the  father  died  and  the  three 
sons  set  off  to  seek  their  fortunes.  The  three  sons 
Peter,  Martin  and  Jack  are  supposed  to  represent  the 
Roman  Catholic,  the  Anglican  and  the  Dissenting 
bodies ;  the  will  is  supposed  to  be  the  New  Testament. 
The  story  goes  on  that  for  seven  years,  {i.e.  the  first 
seven  centuries)  the  brothers  lived  quietly  together 
without  disturbance,  taking  great  care  of  their  coats  : 
after  this  they  grew  restless,  and  having  set  out  to  see 
the  world  came  in  contact  with  various  distractions, 
or,  in  other  words,  corruption  ensued  in  these  sacred 
bodies  and  those  in  authority  fell  victims  to  covetous- 
ness,  ambition  and  pride,  or  to  the  Duchess  D'Argent, 
Mademoiselle  de  Grands  Titres,  and  the  Countess 
d'  Orgueil. 

The  three  ladies  introduced  the  young  men  to 
all  the  customs  of  the  town  and  Court  so  that  they 
were  soon  thoroughly  an  fait  with  all  the  abuses 
imaginable. 

Here,  however,  dispute  arose  between  conscience 
and  inclination.  The  brothers,  in  order  to  be  quite 
fashionable,  must  worship  at  the  shrine  of  a  certain 
new  sect.  "They  worshipped,"  says  the  writer,  "a 
sort  of  idol,  who,  as  their  doctrine  delivered,  did  daily 
create  men  by  a  kind  of  manufacturing  operation. 
This  idol  they  placed  in  the  highest  part  of  the  house, 
on  an  altar  erected  about  three  feet :  he  was  shewn  in 
the  posture  of  a  Persian  emperor,  sitting  on  a  super- 
ficies, with  his  legs  interwoven  under  him.  This  god 
had  a  goose  for  his  ensign :  whence  it  is  that  some 
learned   men   pretend    to   deduce  his    original   from 


THE   POET  AND   MORALIST  207 

lupiter  Capitolinus.  At  his  left  hand,  beneath  the 
altar,  Hell  seemed  to  open,  and  catch  at  the  animals 
the  idol  was  creating :  to  prevent  which,  certain  of  his 
priests  hourly  flung  in  pieces  of  the  unformed  mass 
or  substance,  and  sometimes  whole  limbs  already  en- 
livened, which  that  horrid  gulf  insatiably  swallowed, 
terrible  to  behold.  The  goose  was  also  held  a  sub- 
altern divinity  or  deus  minorum  gentium,  before  whose 
shrine  was  sacrificed  that  creature  whose  hourly  food 
is  human  gore,  and  who  is  in  so  great  renown  abroad, 
for  being  the  delight  and  favourite  of  the  Egyptian 
Carcopithecus.  Millions  of  these  animals  were  cruelly 
slaughtered  every  day  to  appease  the  hunger  of  that 
consuming  deity.  The  chief  idol  was  also  worshipped 
as  the  inventor  of  the  yard  and  needle :  whether  as 
the  god  of  seamen,  or  on  account  of  certain  other 
mystical  attributes,  has  not  been  sufficiently  cleared. 

"The  worshippers  of  this  deity  had  also  a  system 
of  their  belief,  which  seemed  to  turn  upon  the  following- 
fundamentals.  They  held  the  universe  to  be  a  large 
suit  of  clothes,  which  invests  everything  :  that  the 
earth  is  invested  by  the  air:  the  air  is  invested  by  the 
stars,  and  the  stars  are  invested  by  the  primum 
mobile.  Look  on  this  globe  of  earth.  You  will  find 
it  to  be  a  very  complete  and  fashionable  dress.  What 
is  that  which  some  call  land,  but  a  fine  coat  faced  with 
green  ?  or  the  sea,  but  a  waistcoat  of  water-tabby  ? 
Proceed  to  the  particular  works  of  the  creation  you 
will  find  how  curious  journeyman  Nature  has  been  to 
train  up  the  vegetable  beaux  :  to  observe  how  sparkish 
a  periwig  adorns  the  head  of  a  beech,  and  what  a  fine 


208  DEAN   SWIFT 

doublet  of  white  satin  is  worn  by  the  birch.  To 
conclude  from  all,  what  is  man  himself  but  a  micro- 
coat,  or  rather  a  complete  suit  of  clothes  with  all  its 
trimmings  ?  As  to  his  body  there  can  be  no  dispute  : 
but  examine  even  the  acquirements  of  his  mind,  you 
will  find  them  all  contribute  in  their  order  towards 
furnishing  out  an  exact  dress :  to  instance  no  more  ; 
is  not  religion  a  cloak;  honesty  a  pair  of  shoes  worn 
out  in  the  dirt :  self-love  a  surtout :  vanity  a  shirt :  and 
conscience  a  pair  of  breeches  ? 

"These  postulates  being  admitted,  it  will  follow  in 
due  course  of  reasoning,  that  those  beings,  which  the 
world  calls  improperly  suits  of  clothes,  are  in  reality 
the  most  refined  of  animals ;  or  to  proceed  higher, 
that  they  are  rational  creatures  or  men.  For,  is  it  not 
manifest,  that  they  live  and  move  and  talk  and  perform 
all  other  offices  of  human  life  ?  Are  not  beauty  and 
wit  and  mien  and  breeding,  their  inseparable  pro- 
prieties? In  short  we  see  nothing  but  them,  hear 
nothing  but  them.  Is  it  not  they  who  walk  the  streets, 
fill  up  parliament — coffee — play-houses  ?  It  is  true 
indeed  that  these  animals,  which  are  vulgarly  called 
suits  of  clothes,  or  dresses,  do,  according  to  certain 
compositions,  receive  different  appellations.  If  one 
of  them  be  trimmed  up  with  a  gold  chain,  and  a  red 
gown,  and  a  white  rod,  and  a  great  horse,  it  is  called 
a  Lord  Mayor  :  if  certain  ermines  and  furs  be  placed 
in  a  certain  position,  we  style  them  a  judge :  and  so 
our  apt  conjunction  of  lawn  and  black  satin  we  entitle 
a  Bishop. 

"  Others  of  these  proposers,  though  agreeing  in  the 


THE   POET  AND   MORALIST  209 

main  system,  were  yet  more  refined  upon  certain 
branches  of  it :  and  held  that  man  was  an  animal 
compounded  of  two  dresses,  the  natural  and  celestial 
suit,  which  were  the  body  and  soul :  that  the  soul  was 
the  outward  and  the  body  the  inward  clothing :  that 
the  latter  was  ex  traduce :  but  the  former  of  daily 
creation  and  circumfusion  :  this  last  they  proved  by 
scripture,  because  in  them  we  live  and  move  and 
have  our  being;  as  likewise  by  philosophy,  because 
they  are  all  in  all  and  all  in  every  part.  Besides,  said 
they,  separate  these  two,  and  you  will  find  the  body 
to  be  only  a  senseless,  unsavoury  carcase.  By  all 
which  it  is  manifest,  that  the  outward  dress  must 
needs  be  the  soul.  To  this  system  of  religion  were 
tagged  several  subaltern  doctrines  which  were  enter- 
tained with  great  vogue,  as  particularly,  the  faculties 
of  the  mind  were  deduced  by  the  learned  in  this 
manner  :  embroidery  was  sheer  wit ;  gold  fringe  was 
agreeable  conversation ;  gold  lace  was  repartee :  a 
huge  long  periwig  was  humour,  and  a  coat  full  of 
powder  was  very  good  raillery :  all  which  required 
abundance  of  finesse  and  delicateness  to  manage  with 
advantage,  as  well  as  a  strict  observance  after  times 
and  fashions." 

The  writer  continues :  "  I  have,  with  much  pains 
and  reading,  collected  out  of  ancient  authors  this 
short  summary  of  a  body  of  philosophy  and  divinity, 
which  seems  to  have  been  composed  by  a  vein  and 
race  of  thinking  very  different  from  any  other  systems 
either  ancient  or  modern.  And  it  was  not  merely  to 
entertain  or  satisfy  the  reader's  curiosity,  but  rather 


210  DEAN    SWIFT 

to  give  him  liglit  into  several  circumstances  of  the 
following  story  ;  that  knowing  the  state  of  dispositions 
and  opinions  in  an  age  so  remote,  he  may  better 
comprehend  those  great  events  which  were  the  issue 
of  them.  I  advise  therefore  the  courteous  reader  to 
peruse  with  a  world  of  application,  again  and  again 
whatever  I  have  written  upon  this  matter,  and 
leaving  these  broken  ends  I  carefully  gather  up  the 
chief  threads  of  my  story  and  proceed." 

This  passage  is  perhaps  one  of  the  best  instances 
of  Swift's  humour.  It  contains  four-fold  satire  of  the 
most  scathing  character,  yet,  withal,  containing  in  its 
depth  hidden  laughter.  Our  own  philosopher  of 
clothes  has  not  surpassed  the  satire  on  dress.  The 
idol  spoken  of  here  is  the  tailor.  And  with  all  i'ns  is 
interwoven  an  attack  on  the  philosophical  systems  of 
the  day  which  is  biting  in  its  irony. 

The  institution  of  this  religion  in  the  fashionable 
world  of  necessity  caused  the  brothers  some  qualms 
of  conscience.  To  meet  with  favour  at  court  they 
must  adopt  the  prevailing  modes  of  dress.  The 
difficulty  of  one  detail  after  another  was  overcome  by 
some  subterfuge  or  quibble  owing  to  Peter's  wonder- 
ful scholarship  and  erudition,  without  any  actual 
violation  of  the  father's  will,  until,  "  by  long  practice 
in  this  art,  he  succeeded  in  contriving  a  deed  of  con- 
veyance of  that  house  to  himself  and  his  heirs  :  upon 
which  he  took  possession,  turned  the  young  squires 
out,  and  received  his  brothers  in  their  stead." 

From  this  time  he  adopted  the  title  of  my  Lord 
Peter.     With  this  were  introduced  Terra  Australia, 


THE   POET  AND   MORALIST  211 

Incognita  and  Purgatory,  various  remedies  under 
which  are  satirized  penance  and  absolution  and  the  con- 
fessional, indulgences,  holy  water,  etc.  The  narrative 
proceeds  to  relate  in  satiric  form  the  institution  of  all 
the  details  of  the  Roman  Catholic  religion  until  Lord 
Peter  became  so  violent  that  he  turned  his  brothers 
bodily  out  of  doors.  The  fate  of  Martin  and  Jack  is 
then  treated.  They  both  long  to  restore  their  coats 
to  their  primitive  plainness.  Martin's  work  is  pre- 
pared with  exemplary  care  and  patience  so  that  he 
only  discards  the  abuses,  while  Jack's  undisciplined 
mind  rejects  both  use  and  abuse  alike.  Moreover,  he 
now  began  to  receive  nicknames  of  various  sorts  and 
to  further  the  foundation  of  various  sects  such  as  the 
iEolists.  This  is  followed  by  various  absurdities,  all 
of  which  point  to  Jack's  lack  of  discrimination,  until 
by  a  slight  turn  Peter  and  Jack  are  made  to  meet  in 
many  ways,  until  Peter  and  he  both  get  into  serious 
trouble.  Martin  has  by  this  time  distinctly  separated 
from  both  parties.  An  effort  is  made  to  reconcile 
Peter  and  Martin  but  without  success,  until  Martin  is 
replaced  by  a  fourth  called  by  the  author  Lady  Bess's 
institution,  after  which  the  struggle  between  Jack  and 
Peter  grows  more  and  more  severe. 

Thus  the  story  wanes  to  a  close,  nor  is  there  an 
end  to  it,  as  of  course  there  cannot  be.  The  author's 
genius  does  not  come  out  in  the  mere  narration,  it  lies 
rather  in  the  touches  which  are  given  to  the  main 
story.  All  the  details  which  the  writer  wishes  to 
attack  are  clearly  described  under  a  disguise  complete 
in  itself,  though  so  obvious  that  the  most  inaccurate 


212  DEAN    SWIFT 

observer  cannot  fail  to  recognize  it.     It  is  in  this  that 
the  exuberance  of  Swift's  imaginative  faculty  is  at  its 
best.     Here   there   is   a  trace,  just   a  touch,   of  that 
special  feature  of  his  genius  which  finds  its  greatest 
display  in  "  Gulliver's  Travels."    There  is,  however, 
onething  lacking  which  it  must  have  to  reach  the  height 
of  satirical   genius.     There  is  little,  if  any,  satirical 
irony.     It  is  blatant  in  its  satire,  and  herein  lies  its 
greatest  defect.     But  it  is  the  defect  perhaps  due  to 
youthfulness  and  lack  of  experience.     Greater  know- 
ledge of  life  would  have  given  the  writer  that  refine- 
ment of  satire  which  he  so  conspicuously  lacks.     To 
some  extent   this  quality  can  never  be  his  because, 
though  his  knowledge  of  human  nature  is  fairly  great, 
yet   he  lacks    one   thing,    an   understanding    of   the 
passions  of  human  nature,  hence  his  incompleteness- 
Perhaps  this  understanding  is  the  faculty  which  is 
lacking  to  all  but  the  highest  satire.     It  is  this  faculty 
alone  which  to  its  possessor  renders  impossible  satire 
of  the  Juvenilian  type  which  is  an  inferior  type.     He 
who  can  look  kindly  on  the  foibles  of  human  nature  and 
try  to  cure  by  laughter,  with,  however,  the  serious 
note  behind,  is  the  greatest  satirist.     He  is  the  great 
human   because    he    possesses  those    faculties,    the 
capacity  for  passion  and  emotion,  which  make  human 
nature  great  and  which  at  the  same  time  give  to  it  its 
capacity  for  weakness.     But  it  is  only  this  man  who 
has  the  right  or  the  ability  to  satirize  the  human  race. 
Thus  Swift  cannot  fully  satirize  the  Church  because 
he    has    no    faculty    for    religious    enthusiasm,    for 
spiritual  emotion.     Hence  some  of  his  diatribes  must 


THE   POET   AND    MORALIST  213 

fall  to  the  ground  because  they  are  based  on  a  partial 
truth,  and  satire  to  be  effective  must  be  based  on  a 
knowledge  of  the  whole  truth,  though  for  purposes  of 
this  kind  of  work  only  one  side  of  it  may  be  allowed 
to  be  in  evidence.  By  neglecting  the  full  aspect  of 
the  truth,  moreover,  he  has  shown  his  hand  too 
clearly,  and  he  stands  out  by  this  work  as  the  ex- 
ponent of  Anglican  principles  at  the  expense  of  all 
others.  In  taking  so  comprehensive  a  subject  as 
English  religious  bodies  for  the  object  of  his  satire, 
he  should  rather  have  allowed  his  own  personal 
feelings  to  be  placed  on  one  side,  and  thus  his  work 
as  being  more  complete  would  have  been  infinitely 
more  effective.  He  has  by  no  means  yet  reached  the 
highest  attainment  of  which  his  satiric  faculty  is 
capable.  "What  a  genius  I  had  when  I  wrote  that 
book,"  he  says  of  himself  later.  He  should  rather 
have  said,  "  What  potentiality  for  genius  I  had,"  and 
applied  the  other  remark  to  "Gulliver's  Travels"  :  It  is 
the  undiscriminating  attack  of  a  youthful  mind.  It 
contains  the  exuberance  of  a  first  work.  It  is 
essentially  the  work  of  a  young  writer  whose  genius 
bubbles  forth  absolutely  without  restraint. 

This  feature  is  also  found  in  that  part  of  the 
work  which  deals  with  literary  criticism ;  but  here 
it  is  slightly  toned  down.  Perhaps  this  passage  is 
a  striking  instance  : — 

"  I  confess  to  have,  for  a  long  time,  borne  a  part 
in  this  general  error :  from  which  I  should  never 
have  acquitted  myself,  but  through  the  assistance  of 
our  noble  moderns  !   whose  most   edifying  volumes 


214  DEAN   SWIFT 

I  turn  indefatigably  over  night  and  day  for  the 
improvement  of  my  mind,  and  the  good  of  my 
country.  These  have,  with  unwearied  pains,  made 
many  useful  searches  into  the  weak  side  of  the 
ancients,  and  given  us  a  comprehensive  list  of  them. 
Besides  they  have  proved  beyond  contradiction  that 
the  very  finest  things  delivered  of  old,  have  been 
long  since  invented  and  brought  to  light  by  much 
later  pens :  and  that  the  noblest  discoveries  these 
ancients  ever  made,  of  art  or  nature,  have  all  been 
produced  by  the  transcending  genius  of  the  present 
age,  which  clearly  shews  how  little  merit  those 
ancients  can  justly  pretend  to,  and  takes  off  that 
blind  admiration  paid  them  by  men  in  a  corner,  who 
have  the  unhappiness  of  conversing  too  little  with 
present  things." 

The  following  passage  perhaps  is  an  instance  of 
the  youthful  genius  who  does  not  understand  the 
refinement  of  satire  :  "  For  all  human  actions  seem 
to  be  divided,  like  Themistocles  and  his  company  ; 
one  man  can  fiddle,  and  another  can  make  a  small 
town  a  great  city;  and  he  that  cannot  do  either  one 
or  the  other  deserves  to  be  kicked  out  of  the 
creation." 

Much  of  the  work  is  occupied  with  criticisms  on 
the  Moderns  in  favour  of  the  Ancients  as  the  two 
learned  parties  were  then  called.  An  attack  lately 
made  on  Homer  is  satirized  in  the  following  passage 
among  others : — 

"  But  besides  these  omissions  in  Homer  alread}' 
mentioned,   the    curious    reader    will    also    observe 


THE   POET  AND    MORALIST  215 

several  defects  in  that  author's  writings,  for  which 
he  is  not  altogether  so  accountable.  For  whereas 
every  touch  of  knowledge  has  received  such  wonder- 
ful acquirements  since  his  age,  especially  within 
these  last  three  years,  or  thereabouts,  it  is  almost 
impossible  he  could  be  so  very  perfect  in  modern 
discoveries  as  his  advocates  pretend.  We  freely 
acknowledge  him  to  be  the  inventor  of  the  compass, 
of  gunpowder,  and  the  circulation  of  the  blood:  but 
I  challenge  any  of  his  admirers  to  shew  me,  in  all 
his  writings,  a  complete  account  of  the  spleen.  Does 
he  not  also  leave  us  wholly  to  seek  in  the  art  of 
political  wagering  ?  What  can  be  more  defective 
and  unsatisfactory  than  his  long  dissertation  upon 
tea  ?  and  as  to  his  method  of  salivation  without 
mercury  so  much  celebrated  of  late,  it  is  to  my  own 
knowledge  and  experience  a  thing  very  little  to  be 
relied  on." 

The  modern  habit  of  writing  long  prefaces  to  books 
is  satirized  to  the  following  effect :  "  On  the  strength 
of  which  title,  I  do  utterly  disapprove  and  declare 
against  that  pernicious  custom,  of  making  the  preface 
a  bill  of  fare  to  the  book.  For  I  have  always  looked 
upon  it  as  a  high  point  of  indiscretion  in  monster- 
mongers,  and  other  retailers  of  strange  sights,  to 
hang  out  a  fair  large  picture  over  the  door,  drawn 
after  the  life,  with  a  most  eloquent  description  under- 
neath. This  hath  saved  me  many  a  threepence  :  for 
my  curiosity  v/as  fully  satisfied,  and  I  never  offered 
to  go  in,  though  often  invited  by  the  urging  and 
attending  orator,  with  his  last  moving  and  standing 


2i6  DEAN   SWIFT 

piece  of  rhetoric,  'Sir,  upon  my  word,  we  are  just 
going  to  begin.'  Such  is  exactly  the  fate,  at  this 
time,  of  Prefaces,  Epistles,  Advertisements,  Introduc- 
tions, Prolegomenas,  Apparatuses,  To  the  Readers ! 
This  expedient  was  admirable  at  first :  our  great 
Dryden  has  long  carried  it  as  far  as  it  would  go,  and 
with  incredible  success.  He  has  often  said  to  me 
in  confidence  that  the  world  would  never  have 
suspected  him  to  be  a  poet,  if  he  had  not  assured 
them  so  frequently  in  his  prefaces,  that  it  was 
impossible  they  could  either  doubt  or  forget  it. 
Perhaps  it  may  be  so." 

There  is  a  satirical  passage  on  the  modern  lack 
of  scholarship.  "  The  whole  course  of  things  being 
thus  entirely  changed  between  us  and  the  ancients, 
and  the  moderns  wisely  sensible  of  it,  we  of  this 
age  have  discovered  a  shorter  and  more  prudent 
method,  to  become  scholars  and  wits,  without  the 
fatigue  of  reading  or  of  thinking.  The  most  accom- 
plished way  of  reading  books  at  present  is  twofold  ; 
either,  first,  to  serve  them  as  some  men  do  lords, 
learn  their  titles  exactly,  and  then  brag  of  their 
acquaintance.  Or,  secondly,  which  is  indeed  the 
choicer,  the  profounder  and  politer  method,  to  get  a 
thorough  insight  into  the  index,  by  which  the  whole 
book  is  governed  and  turned,  like  fishes  by  the  tail. 

"  By  these  methods,  in  a  few  weeks,  there  starts 
up  many  a  writer,  capable  of  managing  the  pro- 
foundest  and  most  universal  subjects.  For,  what 
though  his  head  be  empty,  provided  his  common- 
place book  be  full,  and  if  you  will  bate  him  but  the 


THE   POET  AND   MORALIST  217 

circumstances  of  method  and  style  and  grammar,  and 
invention  :  allow  him  but  the  common  privileges  of 
transcribing  from  others,  and  digressing  from  him- 
self, as  often  as  he  shall  see  occasion :  he  will  desire 
no  more  ingredients  towards  fitting  up  a  treatise, 
that  he  shall  make  a  very  comely  figure  on  a  book- 
seller's shelf;  there  to  be  preserved  neat  and  clean 
for  a  long  eternity,  adorned  with  the  heraldry  of 
its  title  inscribed  on  a  label ;  never  to  be  thumbed 
or  greased  by  students,  nor  bound  to  everlasting 
chains  of  darkness  in  a  library  :  but,  when  the  fulness 
of  time  is  come,  shall  happily  undergo  the  trial  of 
purgatory,  in  order  to  ascend  the  sky." 

The  development  of  the  tale,  which  includes  the 
story  of  jack's  madness,  here  leads  to  a  digression 
on  Madness  which  might  be  thought  unnecessary 
to  the  continuation  of  the  work. 

The  "  Battle  of  the  Books  "  strikes  the  note  of  youth 
more  apparently  than  the  "  Tale  of  a  Tub ; "  the  satire 
is  more  obvious  and  therefore  less  interesting.  It  is 
the  least  important  of  the  three,  both  from  its  intrinsic 
literary  value  and  also  from  the  light  which  it  throws 
on  Swift's  genius.  Its  chief  value  is  a  historical  one 
as  illustrating  to  some  slight  extent  the  controversy 
between  the  Ancients  and  the  Moderns.  Its  merit 
lies  also  in  individual  passages  which  would  have 
been  no  discredit  to  Swift  even  at  the  height  of  his 
genius.  He  describes  Bentley  thus  :  "The  guardian 
of  the  regal  library,  a  person  of  great  valour,  but 
chiefly  reverenced  for  his  humanity,  had  been  a  fierce 
champion  for  the  Moderns :  and,  in  an  engagement 


2i8  DEAN   SWIFT 

upon  Parnassus,  had  vowed,  with  his  own  hands,  to 
knock  down  the  Ancient  chiefs,  who  guarded  a  small 
pass  on  the  superior  rock  ;  but  endeavouring  to  climb 
up,  was  cruelly  obstructed  by  his  own  unhappy 
weight,  and  tendency  towards  his  centre,  a  quality 
to  which  those  of  the  Modern  party  are  extremely 
subject :  for,  being  lightheaded,  they  have,  in  specu- 
lation, a  wonderful  agility,  and  conceive  nothing 
too  high  for  them  to  mount ;  but,  in  reducing  to 
practice,  discover  a  mighty  pressure  about  their 
heels." 

The  picture  of  Criticism  is  a  fine  piece  of  work 
recalling  the  vividness  and  realism  of  Spenser's 
description  :  "  Meanwhile  Momus,  fearing  the  worst, 
and  calling  to  mind  an  ancient  prophecy,  which  bore 
no  very  good  face  to  his  children  the  Moderns,  sent 
his  flight  to  the  region  of  a  malignant  deity,  called 
Criticism.  She  dwelt  on  the  top  of  a  snowy  mountain 
in  Nova  Zembla:  there  Momus  found  her  extended 
in  her  den,  upon  the  spoils  of  numberless  volumes, 
half-devoured.  At  her  right  hand  sat  Ignorance,  her 
father  and  husband,  blind  with  age :  at  her  left  Pride, 
her  mother,  dressing  her  up  on  the  scraps  of  paper 
herself  had  torn.  There  was  Opinion  her  sister,  light 
of  foot,  hoodwinked  and  headstrong,  yet  giddy  and 
perpetually  turning.  About  her  played  her  children. 
Noise  and  Impudence,  Dullness  and  Vanity,  Positive- 
ness,  Pedantry  and  Ill-manners.  The  goddess  her- 
self had  claws  like  a  cat :  her  head,  and  ears,  and 
voice,  resembled  those  of  an  ass :  her  teeth  fallen  out 
before,  her  eyes  turned  inward,  as  if  she  looked  only 


THE   POET  AND   MORALIST  219 

upon  herself:   her  diet  was  the  overflowing  of  her 
own  gall,  etc." 

Criticism's  own  account  of  herself  is  also  worthy 
of  quotation.  "Tis  I,"  she  said,  "who  give  wisdom 
to  infants  and  idiots :  by  me,  children  grow  wiser 
than  their  parents ;  by  me,  beaux  become  politicians, 
and  schoolboys  judges  of  philosophy  :  by  me, 
sophisters  debate,  and  conclude  upon  the  depths  of 
knowledge :  and  coffee-house  wits,  instinct  by  me, 
can  correct  an  author's  style,  and  display  his  minutest 
errors,  without  understanding  a  syllable  of  his  matter 
or  language.  By  me,  striplings  spend  their  judgment 
as  they  do  their  estate,  before  it  comes  into  their 
hands.  'Tis  I  who  have  deposed  wit  and  knowledge 
from  their  empire  over  poetry,  and  advanced  myself 
in  their  stead." 

Perhaps  the  description  of  the  encounter  between 
Virgil  and  Dryden  wins  the  laurel  for  humour  and 
contains  more  of  the  element  of  irony  than  is  to  be 
found  throughout  the  rest  of  the  work,  "  On  the  left 
wing  of  the  horse  Virgil  appeared,  in  shining  armour, 
completely  fitted  to  his  body  :  he  was  mounted  on  a 
dapple-grey  steed,  the  slowness  of  whose  pace  was 
an  effect  of  the  highest  mettle  and  vigour.  He  cast 
his  eye  on  the  adverse  wing,  with  a  desire  to  find  an 
object  worthy  of  his  valour,  when,  behold,  upon  a 
sorrel  gelding  of  a  monstrous  size  appeared  a  foe, 
issuing  from  among  the  thickest  of  the  enemy's 
squadrons:  but  his  speed  was  less  than  his  noise; 
for  his  horse,  old  and  lean,  spent  the  dregs  of  his 
strength  in  a  high  trot,  which,  though  it  made  slow 


220  DEAN   SWIFT 

advances,  yet  caused  a  loud  clashing  of  his  armour, 
terrible  to  hear.  The  two  cavaliers  had  now 
approached  within  the  throw  of  a  lance,  when  the 
stranger  desired  a  parley,  and  lifting  up  the  vizard 
of  his  helmet,  a  face  hardly  appeared  from  within, 
which,  after  a  pause  was  known  for  that  of  the 
renowned  Dryden.  The  brave  Ancient  suddenly 
started,  as  one  possessed  with  surprise  and  dis- 
appointment together:  for  the  helmet  was  nine 
times  too  large  for  the  head,  which  appeared  situate 
in  the  hinder  part,  even  like  the  lady  on  a  lobster, 
or  like  a  mouse  under  a  canopy  of  state,  or  like  a 
shrivelled  beau  within  the  penthouse  of  a  modern 
periwig:  and  the  voice  was  suited  to  the  visage, 
sounding  weak  and  remote.  Dryden,  in  a  long 
harangue,  soothed  up  the  good  Ancient,  called  him 
father,  and,  by  a  large  deduction  of  genealogies  made 
it  plainly  appear  that  they  were  nearly  related. 
Then  he  humbly  proposed  an  exchange  of  armour, 
as  a  lasting  mark  of  hospitality  between  them.  Virgil 
consented  (for  the  goddess  Diffidence  came  unseen, 
and  cast  a  mist  before  his  eyes)  though  his  was  of 
gold,  and  cost  a  hundred  beeves,  the  other's  but  of 
rusty  iron.  However,  this  glittering  armour  became 
the  Modern  yet  worse  than  his  own.  Then  they 
agreed  to  exchange  horses  :  but,  when  it  came  to 
the  trial,  Dryden  was  afraid,  and  utterly  unable  to 
mount." 

Another  characteristic  of  this  work  which  affords 
some  amusement  and  is  too,  perhaps,  an  additional 
proof    of    its    place    in    Swift's    early    work,   is    its 


THE   POET  AND   MORALIST  221 

semi-classical  character.  The  heroic  nature  of  the 
work,  intended  to  be  to  some  extent  an  imitation  of  the 
classical  epic,  abounds  in  similes  of  the  Homeric 
type ;  some  are,  indeed,  a  close  imitation  of  the 
Homeric  simile.  "  Fain  would  he  have  been 
revenged  on  both  ;  but  both  now  fled  different  ways ; 
and  as  a  woman  in  a  little  house  that  gets  a  painful 
livelihood  by  spinning ;  if  chance  her  geese  be 
scattered  o'er  the  common,  she  courses  round  the 
plain  from  side  to  side,  compelling  here  and  there 
the  stragglers  to  the  flock  :  they  cackle  loud,  and 
flutter  o'er  the  champaign.  So  Boyle  pursued,  so 
fled  this  pair  of  friends." 

Here,  as  in  the  Homeric  simile,  the  point  of 
similarity  is  absolutely  single,  almost  momentary, 
and,  as  it  often  seems,  of  secondary  importance. 
The  phraseology  and  the  word-arrangement  are 
also  epic  in  character.  The  work  represents  in 
exaggerated  pictures  the  contest  between  the  Books 
in  St.  James'  Library,  embodying  the  struggle 
between  the  Ancients  and  Moderns,  and  clever  hits 
are  achieved  at  individuals. 

"He  (Wotton)  in  the  meantime,  had  wandered 
long  in  search  of  some  enterprise,  till  at  length  he 
arrived  at  a  small  rivulet,  that  issued  from  a  fountain 
hard  by,  called  in  the  language  of  mortal  men, 
Helicon.  Here  he  stopped,  and,  parched  with  thirst, 
resolved  to  allay  it  in  this  limpid  stream.  Thrice 
with  profane  hands  he  essayed  to  raise  the  water 
to  his  lips,  and  thrice  it  slipped  all  through  his 
fingers.     Then  he  stooped  prone  on  his  breast,  but, 


222  DEAN   SWIFT 

ere  his  mouth  had  kissed  the  liquid  crystal,  Apollo 
came,  and  in  the  channel  held  his  shield  betwixt 
the  Modern  and  the  fountain,  so  that  he  drew  up 
nothing  but  mud.  For,  although  no  fountain  on 
earth  can  compare  with  the  clearness  of  Helicon, 
yet  there  lies  at  bottom  a  thick  sediment  of  slime 
and  mud,  for  so  Apollo  begged  of  Jupiter,  as  a 
punishment  to  those  who  durst  attempt  to  taste 
it  with  unhallowed  lips,  and  for  a  lesson  to  all  not 
to  draw  too  deep  or  far  from  the  spring." 

The  existence  of  the  episode  of  the  bee  and  the 
spider  is  difficult  to  understand.  It  is  impossible 
to  suppose  that  Swift  merely  meant  to  draw,  by 
its  means,  a  likeness  between  the  dispute  of  the 
Ancients  and  Moderns  and  the  quarrel  of  the  bee  and 
the  spider.  Such  a  conclusion  would  belie  the 
writer's  sense  of  humour.  It  appears  to  be  rather 
a  mirror  in  which  the  chief  disputants  in  the  story 
see  themselves  reflected,  as  there  is  obviously  a 
parallel  to  be  drawn  between  the  two  disputes. 
Again  by  the  use  of  it  he  emphasizes  the  frivolity 
and  emptiness  of  the  famous  quarrel  by  making  the 
disputants  turn  aside  from,  and  momentarily  forget 
their  serious  quarrel,  to  listen  to  the  struggle  going 
on  in  beast  land,  only  to  realize,  when  the  quarrel 
is  over,  that  they  are  themselves  but  repeating  the 
self-same  theme. 

The  whole  of  Swift's  other  work,  however,  sinks 
into  insignificance  before  his  greatest  creation,  "  Gul- 
liver's Travels."  In  this  monument  is  manifested, 
perhaps,  every  element  of  the  literary  genius  of  this 


THE   POET  AND   MORALIST 

man-mountain    of    English    Literature.      It     isi 
million-eyed,  hundred-headed   hydra  product  o 
great  man's  power.     It  is  the  greatest  human  s^, 
that  has  ever  been  written. 

That  ogle-eyed,  pot-bellied  sphinx,  Human 
Nature,  enthroned  on  a  pedestal  whose  roots  are 
eaten  away  by  the  worm  Imagination,  whose  ex- 
tremities are  human  institutions,  the  reflections  of 
man's  cunning  and  the  abuse  of  his  power,  shrieks 
under  the  scalpel  of  the  operator,  who  pays  no  heed 
to  the  anti-vivisectionists'  appeal  for  anaesthetics, 
now  for  the  victims,  now  for  the  audience.  Now  it 
is  placed  under  a  magnifying-glass  until  it  fills  the 
whole  of  the  vision,  and  its  defects  and  sores  are  too 
loathsome  for  the  eye  to  look  on  unshielded.  Now 
it  is  minimized  until  it  becomes  a  mere  insect  walk- 
ing on  the  glass,  too  insignificant  to  be  considered 
a  motive  force  in  the  Universe,  where  it  is  but 
an  atom  in  the  mighty  fabrication  of  an  Idea  too 
enormous  to  be  grasped.  It  is  stripped  of  every 
cloak  which  it  wears,  and  every  instinct,  every 
emotion  is  held  up,  writhing,  before  the  grinning 
gaze  of  an  audience  ready  to  rejoice  in  the  pain  of 
brother  man,  but,  at  the  same  time,  too  thick-skinned 
to  feel  that  the  vulture  is  gnawing  even  at  his  own 
vitals.  Nor  is  it  only  man's  temperament  and 
character  which  are  attacked.  His  little  toys  and 
playthings,  his  systems  of  Government,  his  systems 
of  acquiring  knowledge,  his  scientific  systems,  all 
meet  with  the  same  unsparing  ridicule.  Now  he 
masquerades  as  a  gigantic   booby  before  a  host  of 


224  DEAN    SWIFT 

marionettes,  of  wooden  dolls  whose  very  success 
in  systems  satirizes  the  human  being  who  in 
the  absence  of  his  moral  eyesight  piles  one  false 
system  on  another  in  the  hope  of  making  a 
perfect  one.  It  is  the  task  of  an  insane  Heracles 
to  sweep  out  the  Augean  stable  with  a  club,  and 
this  is  the  occupation  in  which  man  is  represented, 
while  a  host  of  almost  invisible  imps  dances  on  and 
about  the  misshapen  Caliban,  who  is  tyrannized 
over  by  a  vindictive  Prospero  in  the  shape  of 
Providence.  Man's  feeble  efforts  are  annulled  by  the 
darts  of  ninepins,  who,  in  their  wooden  consciousness, 
know  that  he  is  best  assailable  as  a  physical  creation. 
/  In  this  work  Swift  has  employed  with  the  utmost 
I  skill  those  weapons  which  are  pre-eminently  his  own, 
I  the  enlargement  of  the  human  stage  by  imagination, 
j  and  the  revelation  of  the  human  character  by  means 
/of  satire.  Herein  lies  the  secret  of  the  almost  un- 
paralleled popularity  of  "Gulliver's  Travels."  It 
contains  a  twofold  appeal,  to  children  and  to  men. 
This  land  of  wonders  with  its  eccentric  names  and 
titles,  with  the  perpetual  contrast  of  big  and  little, 
and  its  consequent  absurdity;  with  the  political  "big 
game "  brought  within  the  region  of  domestic  life, 
appeals  to  the  child's  mind  which  is  always  ready 
to  pass  the  threshold  of  Topsy  Turveydom.  The 
,  grown-up  mind  delights  in  the  more  ludicrous  and 
yet  more  sinister  side  of  the  picture,  for  Swift  has 
dared  to  write  in  black  and  white  what  every  human 
being  knows  and  believes  in  his  inmost  consciousness 
to  be  the  truth  of  that  part  of  mankind  which  he  does 


THE   POET  AND   MORALIST  225 

not  describe  as  the  Ego.  It  is  the  most  typically 
characteristic  of  all  Swift's  work.  It  contains 
complete  in  itself  all  the  characteristics  which 
render  his  other  works  remarkable.  It  is  a  monu- 
ment alike  to  the  greatest  as  to  the  most  unfortunate 
side  of  his  genius.  We  see  in  this  Swift's  almost 
complete  knowledge  of  human  nature,  and  we  see 
the  intensity  of  this  knowledge  carry  him  further 
and  further  along  the  path  on  which  he  has  set  out, 
until,  in  this,  as  in  all  his  other  work,  he  must  carry 
his  main  idea  to  its  logical  conclusion,  and  his 
recognition  of  the  defects  in  human  nature  leads  him 
to  depict  fallen  human  nature,  fallen  indeed  beyond 
all  human  possibilities,  a  description  which  culmi- 
nates in  the  loathsome  and  horrible  picture  of  the 
Yahoos.  The  course  of  the  writer's  thought  is 
not  a  straight  one.  It  begins  with  the  foibles  of 
human  nature  as  affecting  the  individual  and  the 
same  foibles  in  their  effect  on  the  whole  human 
race ;  thus  far  the  tone  is  lightly  humorous,  man's 
little  follies  are  treated  with  gentleness  and  light 
ridicule.  In  the  third  book,  however,  man's  little 
foibles  have  become  follies  of  the  most  serious 
description,  based  on  error.  In  the  fourth  book  man 
and  error  are  identical  terms,  and  the  error  is  gross 
and  unspeakable. 

The  style  and   mode  of  description  are  those  of 
a  garrulous   and    reminiscent  sea-captain,  who   tells   ' 
the  story  in  a  way  simple  enough  to  disarm  suspicion 
and   prevent   expectation   of    any   inner   or   remoter 
meaning.      Hence   comes   the    direct    appeal   to   the 

Q 


226  DEAN   SWIFT 

child's     mind       Whether    intentionally    or    not,    as 

;   representing   the    sea-captain's   narrative,   the    book 

is   loosely   strung  together,   there   is   no  main   plot, 

!<ifand  the  satire  is   so  essentially  different  in  method 

J  in  the  four  books  that  this  alone  forms  an  insufficient 

J,  connection. 

The  voyage  to  Lilliput  represents  Swift  in  contact 
with  human  nature,  as  depicted  in  the  character 
of  the  Lilliputians.  We  are  tempted  to  believe  that 
the  whole  book  is  vaguely  autobiographical.  It  is, 
we  think,  meant  by  the  writer  to  be  considered,  not 
as  an  intensely  serious  satire,  but  rather  as  a  loose 
dissertation.  In  it  he  and  human  nature  are  brought 
into  strong  contrast  with  each  other,  and  human 
nature  is  more  exactly  represented  in  the  Lillipu- 
tians whose  court  and  society,  we  are  tempted  to 
think,  illustrates  English  court  and  society.  Yet, 
on  the  other  hand,  Lilliput  may  be  taken  to  mean 
Ireland  and  Blefuscu  Scotland,  for  the  date  of  the 
supposed  discovery  of  Lilliput  (1699)  coincides 
with  that  of  Swift's  first  introduction  to  Ireland 
as  a  place  of  residence,  namely,  his  acceptance 
of  the  living  of  Laracor.  The  topographical  situa- 
tion of  the  two  countries  supports  this  view, 
while  it  entirely  contradicts  the  theory  generally 
held  that  Lilliput  and  Blefuscu  represent  England 
and  France  respectively.  On  the  other  hand,  there 
are  allusions  to  the  custom  of  the  young  Lilliputians 
and  Blefuscans  travelling  in  each  other's  countries 
for  the  sake  of  completing  their  education,  and  in 
this  case  Ireland  and  Scotland  could  not  be  meant. 


THE   POET  AND   MORALIST  227 

That  Swift  was  not,  or  pretended  not  to  be,  of  a 
scientific  turn  of  mind,  we  have  evidence  in  the  third 
book,  where  science  is  ridiculed  under  the  cloak  of 
the  people  of  Laputa,  and  here,  perhaps  is  another 
instance  of  this  kind.  The  meaning  of  the  voyage 
to  Lilliput  must  therefore  be  taken  as  vague  from 
the  beginning,  and  therefore,  perhaps,  it  is  legitimate 
to  consider  it  as  the  story  of  Swift  and  his  political 
relationships.  If  it  is  to  be  taken  simply  as  a  vague 
representation  of  human  nature,  then  the  question 
arises,  Why  have  we  the  book  on  Brobdingnag  at 
all?  for  this  again  is  merely  a  representation  of 
human  nature  under  another  aspect,  and  it  would 
be  an  insult  to  Swift's  intellect  to  suppose  such  a 
thing.  Therefore  perhaps  we  may  consider  the  first 
book  as  an  apologia  in  which  satire  on  humanitj'' 
enters  incidentally,  arising  from  particular  instances. 
The  second  book  arises  from  the  first,  and  in  it  the 
particular  instances,  as,  for  example,  the  defects  of 
institutions,  are  used  as  illustrations  of  human 
nature.  The  writer  in  the  third  book  has  ceased^. 
to  look  kindly  on  the  nature  of  man,  and  is  becoming 
savagely  ironical  in  his  attack  on  its  defects,  while  in 
the  fourth  book  he  depicts  a  nature  wholly  diseased 
and  wholly  corrupt.  But,  the  question  arises  in 
our  minds,  is  it  human  nature  at  all  ? 

The   introductory  episode  in   Gulliver's   dealings^ 
with  the  Lilliputians,  in  which  the  Giant  lies  quietly 
on  the   ground  for  the   little  people   to   pierce   him 
with    their    arrows,    reminds    us    of    Swift's    treat- 
ment of  those   in   power  in   his  day,   and   his   final 


228  DEAN   SWIFT 

submission  still  further  endorses  this.  Gulliver,  the 
man-mountain,  is  taken  as  a  prisoner  to  the  court 
of  Lilliput  and  is  there  treated  with  more  or  less 
honour  by  the  king  of  the  pigmies.  It  is  in  the 
contrast  between  the  two  whose  function  and 
characteristic  are  of  course  similar,  though  on  a 
different  scale,  that  the  humour  lies,  through  its 
very  incongruity.  There  is  much  quiet  humour 
introduced  at  the  expense  of  the  court  customs  and 
functions.  "The  Emperor  had  a  mind  one  day  to 
entertain  me  with  several  of  the  country  shews 
wherein  they  exceed  all  natives  I  have  known,  both 
for  dexterity  and  magnificence.  I  was  diverted 
with  none  so  much  as  that  of  the  rope-dancers, 
performed  upon  a  slender  white  thread,  extended 
about  two  feet  and  twelve  inches  from  the  ground. 
Upon  which  I  shall  desire  liberty,  with  the  reader's 
patience,  to  enlarge  a  little. 

"This  diversion  is  only  practised  by  those  persons 
who  are  candidates  for  great  employments  and  high 
favour  at  court.  They  are  trained  in  this  art  from 
their  youth,  and  are  not  always  of  noble  birth,  or 
liberal  education.  When  a  great  office  is  vacant, 
either  by  death  or  disgrace  (which  often  happens), 
five  or  six  of  these  candidates  petition  the  Emperor  to 
entertain  his  Majesty  and  the  court  with  a  dance  on 
the  rope,  and  whoever  jumps  the  highest  without 
falling,  succeeds  in  the  office.  Very  often  the  chief 
ministers  themselves  are  commanded  to  shew  their 
skill,  and  to  convince  the  Emperor  that  they  have  not 
lost  their  faculty.     Flimnap,  the  Treasurer,  is  allowed 


THE   POET  AND   MORALIST  229 

to  cut  a  caper  on  the  straight  rope,  at  least  an  inch 
higher  than  any  other  cord  in  the  whole  empire.  I 
have  seen  him  do  the  summerset  several  times 
together  upon  a  trencher  fixed  on  the  rope,  which  is 
no  thicker  than  a  common  pack-thread  in  England. 
My  friend  Reldresal,  principal  secretary  for  private 
affairs,  is,  in  my  opinion,  if  I  am  not  partial,  the  second 
after  the  Treasurer ;  the  rest  of  the  great  officers  were 
much  upon  a  par. 

"  These  diversions  are  often  attended  with  fatal 
accidents,  whereof  great  numbers  are  on  record.  I 
myself  have  seen  two  or  three  candidates  break  a 
limb.  But  the  danger  is  much  greater  when  the 
ministers  themselves  are  commanded  to  shew  their 
dexterity  for,  by  contending  to  excel  themselves  and 
their  fellows,  they  claim  so  far,  that  there  is  hardly 
one  of  them  who  hath  not  received  a  fall,  and  some  of 
them  two  or  three.  I  was  assured  that  a  year  or  two 
before  my  arrival  Flimnap  would  have  infallibly  broke 
his  neck,  if  one  of  the  King's  cushions,  that  accidently 
lay  on  the  ground,  had  not  weakened  the  force  of 
his  fall. 

"  There  is  likewise  another  diversion,  which  is  only 
shewn  before  the  Emperor  and  Empress,  and  first 
minister,  upon  particular  occasions.  The  Emperor 
lays  on  the  table  three  fine  silken  threads  of  six  inches 
long.  One  is  blue,  the  other  red,  and  the  third  green. 
These  threads  are  proposed  as  prizes  for  those 
persons  whom  the  Emperor  hath  a  mind  to  dis- 
tinguish by  a  peculiar  mark  of  his  favour.  The 
ceremony  is  performed  in  his  Majesty's  great  chamber 


230  DEAN   SWIFT 

of  state,  where  the  candidates  are  to  undergo  a  trial  of 
dexterity  very  different  from  the  former,  and  such  as 
I  have  not  observed  the  least  resemblance  of  in  any 
other  country  of  the  old  or  the  new  world.  The 
Emperor  holds  a  stick  in  his  hands,  both  ends  parallel 
to  the  horizon,  while  the  candidates  advancing  one  by 
one,  sometimes  leap  over  the  stick,  sometimes  creep 
under  it  backwards  and  forwards  several  times, 
according  as  the  stick  is  advanced  or  depressed. 
Sometimes  the  Emperor  holds  one  end  of  the  stick, 
and  his  first  minister  the  other :  sometimes  the 
minister  has  it  entirely  to  himself  Whoever  per- 
forms his  part  with  most  agility,  and  holds  out  the 
longest  in  leaping  and  creeping,  is  rewarded  with  the 
blue-coloured  silk :  the  red  is  given  to  the  next,  and 
the  green  to  the  third,  which  they  all  wear  just  twice 
round  about  the  middle :  and  you  see  few  great 
persons  about  this  Court  who  are  not  adorned  with 
one  of  these  girdles." 

Allusions  are  made  throughout  the  book  to  the 
events  which  were  causing  more  or  less  of  an  up- 
heaval throughout  the  country.  The  parties  of  Whig 
and  Tory  respectively  are  satirized  under  the  names 
Tramecksam  and  Slamecksam  "  from  the  high  and 
low  heels  on  their  shoes,  by  which  they  distinguish 
themselves."  "  It  is  alleged  indeed  that  the  high  heels 
are  most  agreeable  to  our  ancient  constitution  :  but, 
however  this  be,  his  Majesty  hath  determined  to  make 
use  of  only  low  heels  in  the  administration  of  the 
Government,  and  all  offices  in  the  gift  of  the  Crown, 
as  you  cannot  but  observe :  and  particularly,  that  his 


THE   POET  AND   MORALIST  231 

Majesty's  Imperial  heels  are  lower  at  least  by  a  drurr 
than  any  of  his  court :  (drurr  is  a  measure  about  the 
fourteenth  part  of  an  inch).  The  animosities  between 
these  two  parties  run  so  high,  that  they  will  neither 
eat  nor  drink,  nor  talk  with  each  other." 

The  disputes  between  Roman  Catholics  and  Pro- 
testants is  discussed  under  the  following  imagery  : 
"  Which  two  mighty  powers  (see  Lilliput  and  Blefuscu) 
have,  as  I  was  going  to  tell  you,  been  engaged  in  a 
most  obstinate  war  for  six  and  thirty  moons  past.  It 
began  upon  the  following  occasion.  It  is  allowed  on 
all  hands,  that  the  primitive  way  of  breaking  eggs 
before  we  eat  them,  was  upon  the  larger  end :  but  his 
present  Majesty's  grandfather,  while  he  was  a  boy, 
going  to  eat  an  egg,  and  breaking  it  according  to  the 
ancient  practice,  happened  to  cut  one  of  his  fingers, 
whereupon  the  Emperor  his  father  published  an  edict, 
commanding  all  his  subjects,  upon  great  penalties,  to 
break  the  smaller  end  of  their  eggs.  The  people  so 
highly  resented  this  law  that  our  histories  tell  us  there 
have  been  six  rebellions  raised  on  that  account, 
wherein  one  Emperor  lost  his  life,  and  another  his 
crown.  These  civil  commotions  were  constantly 
fomented  by  the  monarchs  of  Blefuscu  :  and  when 
they  were  quelled,  the  exiles  always  fled  for  refuge  to 
that  empire.  It  is  computed  that  eleven  thousand  per- 
sons have  at  several  times,  suffered  death,  rather  than 
submit  to  break  their  eggs  at  the  smaller  end.  Many 
hundred  large  volumes  have  been  published  upon  this 
controversy,  but  the  books  of  the  Big  Endians  have 
been  long  forbidden,  and  the  whole  party,  rendered 


232  DEAN    SWIFT 

incapable  by  law  of  holding  employments.  During  the 
course  of  these  troubles,  the  Emperor  of  Blefuscu  did 
frequently  expostulate  by  their  ambassadors,  accusing 
us  of  making  a  schism  in  religion,  by  offending  against 
a  fundamental  doctrine  of  our  great  prophet  Lustrog 
in  the  fifty-fourth  chapter  of  the  Blundecral  (which  is 
their  Alcoran).  This,  however,  is  thought  to  be  a 
mere  strain  upon  the  text :  for  the  words  are  these : 
*  That  all  true  believers  break  their  eggs  at  the 
convenient  end ' :  and  which  is  the  convenient  end, 
seems,  in  my  humble  opinion,  to  be  left  to  every  one's 
own  conscience,  or  at  least  in  the  power  of  the  chief 
magistrate  to  determine.  Now  the  Big  Endian  exiles 
have  found  so  much  credit  in  the  Emperor  of 
Blefuscu's  court,  and  so  much  private  assistance  and 
encouragement  from  their  party  here  at  home,  that  a 
bloody  war  has  been  carried  on  between  the  two 
empires  for  six  and  thirty  moons  with  various 
success ;  during  which  time  we  have  lost  forty  capital 
ships,  and  a  much  greater  number  of  smaller  vessels, 
together  with  thirty  thousand  of  our  best  seamen  and 
soldiers ;  and  the  damage  received  by  the  enemy  is 
reckoned  to  be  somewhat  greater  than  ours.  How- 
ever, they  have  now  equipped  a  numerous  fleet,  and 
are  just  preparing  to  make  a  descent  upon  us."  The 
other  special  points  of  attack  in  the  first  book  are  the 
education  of  children  and  the  system  of  punishment 
commercial  and  civil,  and  these  are  satirized  by  means 
of  description  of  systems  diametrically  opposed  to 
those  of  England,  or  indeed,  any  country. 

The  second  book,  "  A  Voyage  to   Brobdingnag," 


THE   POET  AND   MORALIST  233 

enters  into  a  closer  satirical  description  of  human 
nature  per  se.  It  contains,  indeed,  a  magnificent 
account  in  detail  of  a  supposed  political  system  in 
England,  and  the  satire  occurs  in  the  fact  that  it  is 
entirely  the  opposite  of  the  English  system.  But 
a  definite  key  is  provided  in  the  King's  answer  to 
Swift,  which  is  a  denial  of  even  that  small  amount 
of  good  which  really  exists. 

Women  are  here  attacked  with  some  virulence, 
and  perhaps  it  would  be  truer  to  say  that  their 
defects  are  ridiculed,  for  Swift  is  pre-eminently  the 
upholder  of  the  privileges  of  women,  jealous  of  their 
honour,  and  keenly  sensitive  of  any  slight  which 
is  put  upon  them.  The  whole  book  is,  however, 
general  in  its  character,  and  ends,  as  does  the  first 
book,  with  an  attack  upon  the  ingratitude  of  princes. 

The  third  book  attacks  pseudo-science,  and  the 
pursuit  of  wealth  by  every  means  possible,  which 
was  pre-eminently  a  feature  of  this  time,  as  of  our 
own  generation.  It  is  a  melancholy  attack  on  the 
tendency  in  human  nature  to  pursue  a  myth  in  the 
semblance  of  truth.  It  satirizes  first  false  systems 
of  science,  but  it  is  an  attack  in  a  wider  sense  on 
the  pursuit  of  any  one  object  at  the  expense  of  all 
others,  in  other  words  on  the  lack  of  proportion 
which  characterizes  the  human  mind  and  especially 
the  feminine  mind.  It  is  essentially  a  sad  piece  of 
writing,  rendered  more  so  by  the  autobiographical 
touch  at  the  end  where  Swift,  in  his  account  of  the 
Struldbrugs,  gives  vent  to  his  own  dread  of  old 
age  with    that  accompanying  loss  of  faculties  which 


234  DEAN   SWIFT 

he  was  sure  would  add  to  his  misery  towards  the 
end  of  his  life.  It  is  a  difficult  book  to  read  because 
of  its  horrible  detail,  and  serves  to  pave  the  way  for 
_the  morbidness  of  the  "Voyage  to  the  Houyhnhnms." 
A  question  must  arise  here  as  to  whether  Swift 
really  intended  the  Yahoos  to  represent  human 
nature  at  all,  and  an  elaborate  dissertation  has  been 
written  on  the  subject  to  prove  that,  by  altering  the 
physical  characteristics  of  this  race,  their  likeness  to 
humanity  has  been  mutilated,  and  that  therefore 
they  are  not  meant  by  the  writer  to  be  a  satire  on 
.Jiis  own  species.  Nor  does  he  wish  to  so  materially 
degrade  human  nature  by  drawing  such  a  strong 
contrast  between  the  race  of  man  and  beast  to  the 
great  disadvantage  of  humanity.  Perhaps  this 
theory,  in  its  attempt  to  palliate  the  wrath  of  human 
'2  n  kind,  is  overdrawn.  We  are  tempted  to  believe  that 
Swift  meant  what  he  said,  and  that  he  would  prefer 
not  to  have  any  of  the  bitterness  alleviated.  It  is 
perhaps  to  be  taken  as  the  last  savage  protest  of 
a  mind  bitterly  enraged  against  those  human  beings 
with  whom  he  had  come  closely  in  contact,  those 
men  and  women  who  had  caused  the  ruin  of  all  his 
.projects.  A  life  given  up  to  altruism  means  bitter 
disappointment  for  the  professor  of  this  form  of 
philanthropy,  and  the  philosophical  endurance  of  one 
bitter  failure  after  another,  of  one  act  of  ingratitude 
after  another,  demands  a  height  of  spiritual  uplifting 
of  the  character  greater  than  Swift  possessed.  He 
was  jealous,  too,  for  the  honour  of  his  race,  and  by 
that  strange  distortion  of  temperament,  which  made 


THE   POET  AND   MORALIST  235 

him  earn  the  title  of  "inverted  hypocrite"  by  caring 
nothing  for  his  own  reputation,  he  has  carried  the 
process  into  his  treatment  of  human  nature.  His 
life  may  be  taken  as  a  prototype  of  this,  his  greatest 
work.  At  the  close  of  his  life,  his  hand  is  against 
every  man,  he  thinks  that  every  man's  hand  is 
against  him,  and  puts  into  words  that  belief,  to  him 
a  terrible  truth,  which  has  been  borne  in  upon  him  of, 
sad  necessity.  His  spirit  is  torn  asunder  by  its  very  / 
bitterness,  his  heart,  once  overflowing  with  love  of 
mankind,  now  forced  to  drink  of  its  own  rejected 
fount,  recoils  upon  itself,  and  the  greatest  altruist 
known  to  history  earns  the  title  of  misanthropist.       ^ 


CHAPTER  VII 

SWIFT   IN   IRELAND 

THE  land  which  he  hated  re-echoed  to  Swift's 
first  cry.  The  land  which  he  hated  re- 
sounded with  his  last  words.  But  another 
sound  arose  as  his  last  cry  of  pain  died  away ;  it  was 
the  voice  of  a  people,  a  cry  of  grief  coming  from 
the  heart  of  those  who  mourned  a  benefactor,  whose 
disinterested  care  for  his  proteges  had  given  them 
a  new  dignity,  and  a  sense  of  their  claim  in  the 
universe,  which  they  had  perhaps  never  before 
possessed.  No  one,  be  he  king  or  patriot,  has  ever 
before  claimed  a  whole  nation  as  his  family.  Swift, 
without  consciously  asserting  a  right,  won  Ireland 
body  and  soul,  to  be  his,  until  all  banded  together, 
in  one  united  front,  ready  to  defend  him  against 
every  danger.  No  demagogue  has  known  a  more 
enthusiastic  following.  Swift  achieved  his  triumph 
without  any  of  the  fleeting  or  specious  qualities  of 
the  man  in  the  street,  it  was  permanent  and  entire. 
Nor  have  its  traces  died  away.  No  one  can  visit 
the  country  of  Swift's  enforced  adoption  without 
being  strongly  moved  by  the  devotion  to  the  patriot. 
He  is  not  represented  by  statues.     He  has   a   more 

236 


SWIFT   IN   IRELAND  237 

permanent  throne  in  the  hearts  of  the  people. 
Even  now,  after  the  lapse  of  nearly  two  centuries, 
their  eyes  brighten  at  the  mention  of  the  Dean.  The 
children  run,  to  point  out  to  you  his  birthplace.  He 
is  one  of  the  national  heroes,  and  to  people  of  the 
Celtic  temperament,  a  national  hero  is  a  being  to 
be  loved  and  reverenced  for  ever.  Swift's  story  in 
its  setting  of  Stella's  cottage  at  Trim,  and  Vanessa's 
bower  at  Cellbridge,  appeals  to  the  romance  inherent 
in  an  Irishman's  nature.  A  genuine  interest  in  Swift 
wins  the  allegiance  of  the  Irish  heart.  Reverence  for 
him  opens  the  flood-gates  of  information,  legendary 
or  authentic. 

No.  7,  Hoey's  Court,  then  a  picturesque  old  house, 
the  residence  of  Godwin  Swift,  the  lawyer,  was 
Swift's  birthplace.  It  is  now  pulled  down,  and  a 
heap  of  stones  and  debris  covers  the  site.  It  is 
situated  not  far  from  St.  Patrick's  Cathedral  in  the 
old  part  of  Dublin,  and  the  narrow  squalid  court  is 
graced  by  a  bust  of  the  Dean,  a  hopelessly  bad 
representation,  much  defaced.  Wilde  thus  describes 
the  place  :  "Adjoining  a  portion  of  one  of  the  ancient 
city  walls — one  of  the  few  vestiges  of  them  now 
remaining,  and  running  between  Castle  Street  and 
the  junction  of  Great  and  Little  Ship  Street,  is  a 
narrow  passage  now  called  the  Castle  Steps,  but  in 
former  days  Cole's  Alley.  The  eastern  side  is 
formed  by  the  Castle  wall :  and  about  the  end  of 
the  last  century,  a  number  of  small  open  shops  or 
stalls,  chiefly  occupied  by  buckle-makers  or  cheap 
sellers,  framed  its  western  side.     There  were  then  no 


238  DEAN   SWIFT 

steps  as  at  present,  but  a  very  steep  slippery  descent, 
down  which  the  apprentice  boys  from  Skinner's  Row 
and  the  adjoining  street  occupied  by  artisans  used 
to  run  their  comrades  on  first  joining  the  craft,  as 
a  sort  of  initiatory  "jobbing."  Towards  the  lower 
end  of  this  descent,  on  the  western  side,  another 
alley  led  up  a  few  steps  into  a  small  square  court, 
in  the  mouldering  grandeur  of  the  house  of  which 
we  still  recognize  the  remains  of  a  locality  once 
fashionable  and  opulent.  Here  on  our  right  is  the 
house  occupied  by  Surgeon-General  Buxton;  that 
beyond  it  was  the  residence  of  Lord  Chancellor 
Bowes,  and  a  little  farther  on,  upon  the  right, 
stands  the  celebrated  Eades  Coffee  House,  where 
the  wits  and  statesmen  of  the  day  drank  their 
claret  and  canary.  Upon  the  opposite  side,  where 
the  court  narrows  into  the  lane  that  leads  into 
St.  Werburgh  Street,  is  the  house,  No.  7,  where 
Jonathan  Swift  was  born,  the  30th  November, 
1667.  A  handsome  doorcase  a  few  years  ago 
ornamented  the  front  of  the  house,  but  some  anti- 
quary, it  is  said,  carried  it  away;  the  mark  is  still 
visible." 

Swift  began  life  in  opulent  surroundings,  for  his 
uncle  Godwin  was  then  in  possession  of  a  large 
fortune.  Kilkenny  Grammar  School  and  Trinity 
College  were  the  scenes  of  the  next  two  periods  of 
his  life  in  Ireland.  In  the  story  of  his  College  life 
he  has  been  so  much  confounded  with  his  cousin 
Thomas  Swift,  that  it  is  impossible  to  disentangle 
the  web.     One  fact  is  probably  true,  that  it  was  in 


SWIFT   IN    IRELAND  239 

Swift's  rambles  through  the  streets  of  Dublin  in  his 
College  days  that  he  first  began  to  meet  with  and  learn 
to  know  the  poor  and,  in  some  cases,  lower  classes. 
It  was  his  habit  a  few  years  later  to  associate  with 
those  of  humble  station.  In  his  journeys  from  Moor 
Park  to  his  mother's  house  at  Leicester  he  used  to 
spend  the  night  at  cheap  lodging  houses,  in  order 
to  make  friends  with  those  poorer  than  himself, 
taking  the  very  necessary  precaution  of  paying  six- 
pence extra  for  clean  sheets.  The  result  of  this  was 
his  intimate  knowledge  of  their  characters,  and  his 
association  with  the  servants  and  grooms  at  various 
houses  where  he  stayed,  no  doubt  taught  him  to 
understand  the  workings  of  the  menial  mind.  The 
time  of  his  residence  at  Laracor  is  prolific  with 
stories  and  anecdotes,  for  most  of  which  we  have 
to  thank  Sheridan.  No  doubt  he  did  not  find  the 
living  at  Laracor  inspiriting.  It  was  a  tiny  hamlet 
of  which  the  Church-going  population  numbered 
fourteen.  Swift's  temper  had  been  so  soured  by 
the  repeated  disappointments  he  had  met  with,  that, 
although  the  two  livings  of  Laracor  and  Rathbeggin 
in  the  diocese  of  Meath,  were  much  inferior  in  value 
to  what  he  had  been  promised,  he  received  them  with 
satisfaction,  however  unwilling  he  might  be  to  own 
it,  being  the  first  secure  though  trifling  provision 
he  had  been  able  to  obtain.  Swift  determined  to 
perform  his  journey  to  Laracor  on  foot,  a  mode  of 
travelling  very  customary  with  him.  It  was  the  first 
tour  he  had  ever  made  in  Ireland,  a  country  of  which 
he  had  formed  the  most  contemptible  opinion,  and 


240  DEAN   SWIFT 

not  a  very  good  one  of  the  inhabitants.  He  accord- 
ingly prepared  himself  as  if  he  had  to  penetrate 
into  the  country  of  the  Houyhnhnms  :  but  with  a 
determination  to  be  a  little  better  provided  than  his 
own  Gulliver.  A  decent  suit  of  black  clothes,  with 
strong  worsted  stockings,  of  which  he  carried  a 
second  pair  and  a  shirt  in  his  pocket,  a  large  grey 
surtout,  a  round  slouched  hat,  with  a  pole  consider- 
ably longer  than  himself,  which  he  had  probably 
procured  from  some  country  haymaker,  formed  the 
whole  travelling  accoutrements  of  the  afterwards 
celebrated  Dean  of  St.  Patrick's. 

The  three  towns  of  Navan,  Kells,  and  Trim,  which 
lay  in  Swift's  route  on  his  first  journey  to  Laracor, 
seem  to  have  deeply  arrested  his  attention,  for  he 
has  been  frequently  heard  to  speak  of  the  beautiful 
situation  of  the  first,  the  antiquity  of  the  second,  and 
the  time-shaken  towers  of  the  third.  There  were 
three  inns  in  Navan,  each  of  which  claim  to  this 
day  the  honour  of  having  entertained  Dr.  Swift !  It 
is  probable  that  he  dined  at  one  of  them,  for  it  is 
certain  that  he  slept  at  Kells  in  the  house  of 
Jonathan  Belcher,  a  Leicestershire  man,  who  had 
built  the  inn  in  that  town  on  the  English  model, 
which  still  exists,  and,  in  point  of  capaciousness  and 
convenience,  would  not  disgrace  the  first  road  in 
England.  The  host,  whether  struck  by  the  com- 
manding sternness  of  Swift's  appearance,  or  from 
national  civility,  showed  him  into  the  best  room  and 
waited  himself  at  table.  The  attention  of  Belcher 
seems  so  far  to  have  won    upon  Swift  as  to   have 


SWIFT   IN    IRELAND  241 

produced  some  conversation.  "  You're  an  English- 
man, sir?"  said  Swift.  "Yes,  sir."  "What  is  your 
name?"  "Jonathan  Belcher,  sir."  "An  Englishman 
and  Jonathan  too,  in  the  town  of  Kells — who  would 
have  thought  it !  What  brought  you  to  this  country  ?  " 
"I  came  with  Sir  Thomas  Taylor,  sir;  and  I  believe 
I  could  reckon  fifty  Jonathans  in  my  family."  "Then 
you  are  a  man  of  family?"  "Yes,  sir,  I  have  four 
sons  and  three  daughters  by  one  mother,  a  good 
woman  of  true  Irish  mould."  "  Have  you  been  long 
out  of  your  native  country?"  "Thirty  years,  sir." 
"  Do  you  ever  expect  to  visit  it  again  ?  "  "  Never." 
"Can  you  say  that  without  a  sigh?"  "I  can,  sir; 
my  family  is  my  country ! "  "  Why,  sir,  you  are  a 
better  philosopher  than  those  who  have  written 
volumes  on  the  subject :  then  you  are  reconciled  to 
your  fate ? "  "I  ought  to  be  so ;  I  am  very  happy, 
and  I  like  the  people,  and,  though  I  was  not  born 
in  Ireland,  I'll  die  in  it,  and  that's  the  same  thing." 
Swift  paused  in  deep  thought  for  nearly  a  minute, 
and  then  with  much  energy  repeated  the  first  line 
of  the  preamble  of  the  noted  Irish  Statute — "  Ipszs 
Hibernis  Hiberniores  !  " 

In  spite  of  the  risk  of  this  Life  of  Swift  becoming 
too  anecdotal  in  character,  one  more  story  must  find 
place  here.  "  On  the  evening  of  the  fourth  day  of  his 
pedestrian  journey,  Swift  reached  Laracor.  The 
curate  of  the  parish  was  smoking  his  pipe  at  the  door, 
when  Swift  advancing  with  a  hasty  step,  and  without 
the  least  hesitation,  asked  him  his  name.  The  good 
old   pastor  was   so   struck   with   the   appearance   of 


242  DEAN   SWIFT 

Swift,  and  the  abruptness  of  the  question,  that  he  could 
scarcely  articulate  'Jones.'  'Well,  then,  I  am  your 
master !'  exclaimed  Swift.  When  the  curate  recovered 
a  little  from  his  surprise,  he  bowed  in  silence, 
not  the  bow  of  servility,  but  of  respect.  He  led 
Swift  into  the  best  room  in  his  humble  cottage,  and 
introduced  him  to  his  wife  in  these  words.  .  .  .  'Mary, 
my  dear,  this  is  the  new  vicar  our  new  master.'  Swift 
did  not  attempt  to  qualify  the  harshness  of  the 
expression,  though  it  was  easy  to  perceive  the  effect 
it  had  on  Mrs.  Jones,  and,  as  if  it  were  to  heighten  the 
effect,  pulled  a  shirt  out  of  his  pocket,  and  handed  it 
to  the  lady,  saying,  as  he  stretched  out  his  hand, 
'  Madam,  if  you  are  not  too  proud,  lay  that  shirt  in 
your  drawer,  if  you  have  one.'  Mrs.  Jones  obeyed  in 
silence,  but  trembled  so  violently,  that  it  is  probable 
the  next  minute  she  could  not  tell  where  it  was  laid. 
Swift  then  threw  himself  into  an  armchair,  and  after 
casting  his  eyes  in  a  supercilious  manner  round  the 
room,  neither  the  curate  nor  his  wife  daring  to  speak, 
condescended  to  ask  if  they  had  anything  to  eat. 
This  was  joyful  news  to  Mrs.  Jones,  who  hoped  that 
her  clean  diaper  cloth,  new  plates,  and  a  few  knives 
and  forks  which  had  not  for  a  long  time  been  called 
into  use,  would  relax  the  severity  of  the  vicar's  brow. 
Mr.  Jones'  goodness  of  heart  readily  suggested  to 
him  that  Swift's  ill-humour  arose  from  fatigue,  or 
what  was  still  more  natural,  hunger:  but  he  could 
not,  by  any  conjecture,  get  rid  of  his  first  looks,  and 
the  sound  of  his  words  still  vibrated  on  his  ear. 
Swift  praised  the  table-cloth,  the  order  in  which  the 


SWIFT   IN   IRELAND  243 

plates  were  arranged,  etc.,  which  in  an  instant  wiped 
off  all  the  ill  impressions  Mrs.  Jones  had  entertained. 
He  now  saw  that  he  had  got  the  mastery,  and  was 
determined  to  keep  it. 

"Swift  the  next  morning  inquired  the  character  of 
Mr.  Jones  from  the  parish  clerk,  who  set  him  forth  as 
the  best  of  men,  and  the  first  of  scholars.  He  was 
certainly  well  versed  in  the  Greek  and  Roman  classics, 
and  very  luckily  had  committed  most  of  them  to 
memory  in  his  youth,  for  he  had  only  one  or  two  in 
his  library,  which  consisted  of  a  large  Bible,  Seneca's 
works  in  Latin,  Sir  Walter  Raleigh's  '  History  of  the 
World,'  the  first  edition  of  Chaucer,  and  an  Almanac 
almost  as  old  as  himself.  Mrs.  Jones  likewise  came 
in  for  her  share  of  praise,  particularly  for  affability 
to  inferiors.  She  was  descended  from  one  of  the 
oldest  families  in  the  country ;  nay,  it  was  even  said 
that  there  was  a  small  sprig  of  nobility  in  the  maternal 
line." 

No  doubt  Mr.  and  Mrs.  Jones  were  the  shining 
lights  of  the  village  of  Laracor,  and  had  Swift  been 
dependent  on  them  for  society  he  would  have  been  in 
a  desperate  plight.  For  the  greater  part  of  his 
residence  there,  however,  Stella  was  living  at  Trim, 
three  miles  away,  and  proved  a  solace  to  him  in  the 
dreariness  of  his  work.  He  found  in  his  parish  one 
thoroughly  congenial  soul,  Roger  Cox,  the  clerk. 
We  are  told  that  "  Roger  was  originally  a  hatter  in 
the  town  of  Cavan,  but,  being  of  a  lively,  jovial 
temper,  and  fonder  of  setting  the  fireside  of  a  village 
alehouse  in  a  roar  over  a  tankard  of  ale,  or  a  bowl  of 


244  DEAN    SWIFT 

whiskey,  with  his  flashes  of  merriment  and  gibes  of 
humour,  than  pursuing  the  dull  routine  of  business 
to  which  fate   had  fixed  him,  wisely  forsook  it  for 
the  honourable  function  of  a  parish  clerk,  which  he 
considered  as  an  office  appertaining  in  some  wise  to 
ecclesiastical  dignity,  since   by  wearing  a  band,  no 
small  part  of  the  ornament  of  our  clergy,  he  thought 
he  might  not  unworthily  be  deemed,  as  it  were,  *  a 
shred  of  the  linen  vestment   of  Aaron.'     Nor  was 
Roger  one  of  those  worthy  parish  clerks  who  could 
be  accused  of  merely  humming  the  psalms  through 
the  nostril  as  a  sack-butt,  but  much  oftener  instructed 
and  amused  his  fellow  parishioners  with  the  amorous 
ditties  of  the  'waiting-maid's  lamentation,'  or  one  of 
those  national  songs  which  awake  the  remembrance 
of  glorious  deeds,  and  make  each  man  burn  with  the 
enthusiasm  of  the  conquering  hero.     With  this  jocund 
companion,   Swift   relieved   the    tediousness    of   his 
lonesome  retirement :  nor  did  the  easy  freedom  which 
he  indulged  with  Roger  ever  lead  this  humble  friend 
beyond  the   strict   bounds   of  decorum  and  respect. 
His  dress  was  not  the  least  extraordinary  feature  of 
his  appearance.     He  constantly  wore  a  full-trimmed 
scarlet  waistcoat  of  most  uncommon   dimensions,  a 
light  grey  coat,  which  altogether  gave  him  an  air  of 
singularity  and  whim  as  remarkable  as  his  character. 
The    scarlet    waistcoat    soon    caught    Swift's    eye : 
Roger   bowed  and  observed   that   'he   wore   scarlet 
because  he  belonged  to  the  Church  militant.'    Roger  is 
the  reputed  author  of  many  wise  sa3nngs.     Swift  was 
impatient    to    see    the    church.     It   was    in   a   most 


OLD    I'AFISH    CHURCH    OF    I.ARACOR 

FROM    AN    ENGRAVING 


STELLAS  COTTAGE,  LARACOR 


kni(;htsbrook  rivkr,  i.aracor 

SHOWING   SOME   OK    SUJKTS    WII.I.iAVS,    J'l.ANTEU    BY    HIMSELF 


SWIFT   IN    IRELAND  245 

miserable  plight  indeed.  '  What/  exclaimed  Swift  in 
a  tone  of  the  utmost  indignation,  'could  your  last 
vicar — why  he  must  have  been  a  wretch  indeed,  to 
permit  the  house  of  God  to  sink  in  ruins  under  his 
eye.'  '  Why,'  said  Roger,  '  please  your  reverence,  our  ^ 
last  vicar  lived  by  the  Church,  but  he  did  not  live  in 
it :  and  we,  the  poor  sheep  of  such  a  shepherd,  thought 
it  was  the  finest  pinfold  in  the  world.'  "  The  beauty 
and  magnificent  proportions  of  the  newly  built 
Catholic  church  of  Trim  as  contrasted  with  the  small 
and  unpretentious  church  at  Laracor  may  perhaps  be 
explained  to  some  extent  by  this  story. 

Such  were  Swift's  associates  in  the  village  where 
he  rightly  considered  himself  buried  alive.     Yet  he 
became  very  fond  of  his  willows  at  Laracor.     The 
mental  picture  of  them  was  often  a  great  pleasure  to 
him   when   in   the   middle   of   the   political   ferment. 
This  was  his  home  for  twelve  years.     No  wonder, 
then,  that  he  conceived  some  affection  for  it,  or  that 
he  learnt  to  know  the  character  of  the  people  among 
whom  he  lived.     It  is  difficult  to  understand  why  he 
had  so  little  affection  for  them.     Probably  he  had  a 
real  liking  for  them,  though  once  more  he  wished  to 
maintain  the  character  of  inverted  hypocrite,  and  to 
conceal  his  natural  kindliness  under  a  rough  exterior. 
It  is  difficult  to  believe  that  he  could  expend  all  his 
energies  and  best  efforts  on  the  Irish  nation  as  he 
did  in  the  matter  of  Wood's  Halfpence,  without  any 
basis   of  affection   for   his   actions.      The   village   of 
Laracor,  lying  in  the  middle  of  beautiful  Irish  pasture, 
forms  a  background  for  Swift's  political  life.     Swift's 


246  DEAN   SWIFT 

willows  still  border  the  banks  of  the  stream,  the  well 
beside  which   he   used  to   sit   is   still    pointed    out. 
Everything  breathes  the  spirit  of  the  man  who,  in 
the  middle  of  bitter  political  struggle,  could  turn  in 
imagination  to  the  green  fields  and  budding  hedges 
among  which  walked   the  woman  on  whom  all   his 
highest  thoughts  centred.     His  mind  would  turn  to 
the  walk  beneath  the  willows  which  he  knew  Stella 
I   held   sacred   as   his.      For   more   than   twelve  years 
I  Ireland    meant    for    him    peace    in    the    middle    of 
j  difficulty  and  the  stress   of  battle.      No   doubt,  had 
England  and  English  preferment  been  banished  from 
his  mind,  he  would  have  welcomed  the  idea  of  pro- 
motion in  the  Irish  Church,  but  so  long  as  England 
remained  the  centre  of  life,  Swift  longed  for  office 
'    there.     Hence  in   1713  he  was  bitterly  disappointed 
\   when  he  found  that  Ireland  was  for  the  future  to  be 
the  sphere  in  which  he  was  to  move.     On  his  arrival 
I  in  Dublin  his  worst  expectations  were  fulfilled,  the 
land  of  barbarians  received  him  in  a  most  uncivilized 
manner.      No   doubt  the   people    had   forgotten   his 
success   in   the   matter   of  the   Irish  First-Fruits,  or 
probably,  as  it  only  affected  directly  a  small  number 
of  the  Irish   population,   the  rest  did  not  take  into 
account  Swift's   share   in   the   transaction.      He  was 
received  as  a  Jacobite,  and  was  in  danger  of  violence 
from   the   mob.     From  this   time  Ireland   became    a 
'  country  where  Swift  knew  no  rest.     The  sphere  of 
storm   and  stress  was  transferred.     Ireland   became 
'  a  land  of  trouble.      With  it  came  to   be  connected 
Swift's  saddest  memories,  the  tragedies  of  his  life. 


SWIFT   IN    IRELAND  247 

The  period  of  his  life  through  which  he  had  just 
passed  must  be  accounted  the  happiest,  or  perhaps 
the  only  really  happy  years  of  his  life,  even  though 
throughout  all  this  time  his  heart  was  torn  by  con- 
flicting emotions  and  the  ambitions  and  self-interests 
of  other  men  must  perforce  affect,  if  not  influence,  all 
his  actions.  For  three  years  of  his  life  in  England 
he  had  been  the  centre  of  interest,  the  most  feted  and 
popular  figure  in  political  centres.  All  the  world 
had  bowed  before  him,  he  had  been  welcomed  every- 
where in  political  centres.  His  word  and  favour  had 
been  accepted  in  preference  to  those  of  any  other 
man.  What  a  change  now!  Lord  Orrery  writes: 
"  But  Dr.  Swift  had  little  reason  to  rejoice  in  the  ^ 
land  where  his  lot  had  fallen  :  for,  upon  his  arrival 
in  Ireland  to  take  possession  of  the  deanery,  he  found 
the  violence  of  party  raging  in  that  kingdom  to  the 
highest  degree.  The  common  people  were  taught  to 
look  upon  him  as  a  Jacobite,  and  they  proceeded  so 
far  in  their  detestation,  as  to  throw  stones  and  dirt 
at  him  as  he  passed  through  the  streets.  The  chapter 
of  St.  Patrick's,  like  the  rest  of  the  kingdom,  received 
him  with  great  reluctance.  They  thwarted  him  in 
every  point  that  he  proposed.  He  was  avoided  as  a 
pestilence.  He  was  opposed  as  an  invader.  He  was 
marked  out  as  an  enemy  to  his  country.  Such  was 
his  first  reception  as  Dean  of  St.  Patrick's.  Fewer 
talents  and  less  firmness,  must  have  yielded  to  so 
outrageous  an  opposition,  sed  contra  aiidentior  ibat. 
He  had  seen  enough  of  human  nature,  to  be  con- 
vinced that  the  passions  of  low,  self-interested  minds 


248  DEAN   SWIFT 

ebb  and  flow  continually."  Lord  Orrery  continues 
with  a  slight  rhapsody  on  human  nature.  "They 
love  they  know  not  whom,  they  hate  they  know  not 
why  :  they  are  captivated  by  words  :  guided  by 
names,  and  governed  by  accidents.  Sacheverell  and 
the  Church  had  been  of  as  great  service  to  one  party 
in  the  year  1710,  as  popery  and  slavery  were  to  the 
other  in  the  year  17 13.  But,  to  show  you  the  strange 
revolution  in  this  world,  Dr.  Swift,  who  was  now  the 
detestation  of  the  Irish  rabble,  lived  to  be  afterwards 
the  most  absolute  monarch  over  them  that  ever 
governed  men.  His  first  step  was  to  reduce  to 
reason  and  obedience  his  reverend  brethren,  the 
chapter  of  St.  Patrick's,  in  which  he  succeeded  so 
perfectly  and  so  speedily  that  in  a  short  time  after 
his  arrival,  not  one  member  of  that  body  offered  to 
contradict  him,  even  in  trifles.  On  the  contrary,  they 
held  him  in  the  highest  respect  and  veneration,  so 
that  he  sat  in  the  Chapter-house  like  Jupiter  in  the 
Synod  of  the  Gods.  Whether  fear  or  conviction 
were  the  motives  of  so  immediate  a  change,  I  leave 
you  to  consider,  but  certain  it  is."  Swift  sta^^ed  no 
longer  in  Ireland  than  the  time  demanded  by  his 
installation,  and,  as  Lord  Orrery  has  it,  "to  pass 
through  certain  customs  and  formalities,"  or  to  use 
his  own  words  : — 

"  Through  all  vexation 
Patents,  Instalments,  Abjurations, 
First  Fruits,  and  Tenths,  and  chapter-treats, 
Dues,  Payments,  Fees,  Demands  and  cheats  !  " 

He  then  returned  to  England  to  attempt  to  pacify 


SWIFT   IN   IRELAND  249 

the  Tory  ministers,  but  he  met  with  no  permanent 
success.     He  returned  to  Ireland,  as  it  seemed  to  him, 
to  begin  life  over  again.     It  has  been  the  lot  of  few 
men  perhaps  to  suffer  such  a  complete  break  in  their 
lives  as  Swift  suffered  in  his  removal  to  Dublin.     Few 
men  have  had  the  divisions  of  youth,  maturity  and  old 
age  so  strongly  marked.    For  him  these  periods  of  his 
life  were  so  distinctly  divided  that  we  might  well  say 
of  him  that  he  lived  three  lives ;  but,  alas  for  his  happi- 
ness, the  middle   period,   the   only   one  in  which  he 
found  life  really  congenial,  was  by  far  the  shortest, 
and  the  last  period,  when  the  aspirations  of  youth,  the 
time  of  castle-building,  were  far  behind,  must   have 
seemed  infinitely  the  longest.     Swift's  attitude  to  his 
future  life  in  Ireland  may  seem  strange  to  us  who  live 
under  entirely  different  conditions.     For  an  English 
clergyman  to  enter  on  an  Irish  Deanery  now,  at  the 
age  of  forty-six,  active  politician  though  he  had  been, 
and  though  his  new  life  meant  a  temporary  separation 
from  English  friends,  would  not  appear  a  great  hard- 
ship.    It  would  mean  merely  that  he  transferred  his 
energies,   then   at   their  best  and   highest,   to  a  new 
field,  with  all  the  benefit  of  past  experience  to  help 
him ;  the  facilities  of  transit,  moreover,  are  so  easy 
that  the    distance   from   the    centre    of   his    former 
activities    would    only   mean   additional   pleasure   in 
seeing  his  old  friends  again.     But  what  did  it  mean  to 
Swift  ?     It  meant  complete   separation   from   every- 
thing that  he  cared  for.     Let  us  try  for  one  moment 
to  put  ourselves  in  his  place,  to  assume,  as  far  as  may 
be,  his  disposition  and  attitude  to  life.     As  we  have 


250  DEAN   SWIFT 

said  elsewhere,  in  the  middle  of  the  eighteenth  century 
a  man  began  to  enter  upon  old  age  at  forty-five,  to 
assume  the  characteristics  of  an  old  man,  to  allow 
excuses  to  be  made  for  a  lack  of  energy,  on  the  ground 
of  increasing  years.  He  began  to  think  of  resting 
upon  hardly-won  laurels  in  the  circle  in  which  he  had 
hitherto  moved.  A  prebend's  stall  at  Windsor  would 
have  given  Swift  opportunity  for  this  kind  of  retire- 
ment from  life.  He  appears  at  this  time  to  have  been 
a  contradiction  in  terms.  Convention,  that  long- 
established  dealer  in  temporary  values,  demanded  that 
his  faculties  should  be  wearing  out.  Swift,  the 
ascetic,  in  the  midst  of  men  of  an  early  maturity 
achieved  by  profligacy,  refused  to  acknowledge  any 
symptoms  of  decay.  Apart  from  intermittent  attacks 
of  vertigo,  from  which  he  had  suffered  since  his  boy- 
hood, he  was  at  his  best;  wishful  for  wider  and 
greater  scope  for  his  energies  rather  than  for  a 
smaller  field.  He  knew,  too,  as  only  highly  nervous 
people  can  know,  that  when  once  the  impetus  for 
work  is  removed,  the  character  suffers  loss,  and  the 
power  of  work  is  for  a  time  in  abeyance,  until  another 
impetus  is  provided.  Life  in  Ireland  meant  permanent 
separation  from  two,  at  least,  of  the  men  to  whom  he 
was  attached  by  very  strong  bonds  of  affection.  It 
meant  long  periods  of  separation  from  all  his  other 
English  friends,  and  he  knew  he  would  gradually  dis- 
appear from  the  central  place  in  their  thoughts.  He 
must  have  thought  with  an  almost  savage  despair  that 
many  would  be  glad  of  his  departure,  chiefly  those 
whose  pride  he  had  hurt  by  his  integrity  and  honesty. 


SWIFT   IN    IRELAND  251 

He  was  about  to  be  driven  into  exile  from  the  only 
home  he  had  ever  known  or  would  know,  a  place, 
won,  as  he  thought,  in  the  hearts  and  affections  of 
hundreds.  Pride,  wounded  at  the  thought  that 
England  could  do  without  him,  added  fuel  to  the 
flame,  kindled  now  by  indignation,  now  by  sorrow. 
He  had  been  looked  on  almost  as  the  saviour  of  his 
country.  He  was  now  met  by  yells  of  execration 
from  those  who  greeted  him  as  traitor  and  Jacobite. 
The  great  things  of  life,  as  he  looked  at  them,  had 
been  his,  now  he  was  to  concentrate  his  thoughts  on 
the  small  things.  For  seven  years  he  concentrated 
himself  on  these  little  things  in  the  bitterness  of  his 
heart,  performing  all  the  duties  of  his  office  with  the 
utmost  punctiliousness  and  unfailing  conscientious- 
ness. It  is  no  small  credit  to  him  that  he  could  cast 
aside  the  searchings  of  heart  and  bitterness  of  regret 
to  produce  in  this  last  period  his  greatest  literary 
masterpiece,  and  to  win,  perhaps,  his  greatest  political 
triumph.  It  can  be  so  called  because  it  implied,  as 
none  other  of  his  political  feats  had  done,  the  benefit 
of  suffering  humanity  and  the  rescue  from  starvation 
of  a  whole  people. 

There  were  elements  in  his  exile  the  full  im- 
portance of  which  even  Swift  could  not  calculate. 
If  party  animosity  was  violent  in  England,  it  was  ten 
times  more  so  in  Ireland.  All  the  stories  against 
the  Government  in  England,  authenticated  or  untrue, 
were  believed  and  exaggerated  in  Ireland.  "  The 
dreadful  and  detested  days  of  James  II.,"  says 
Sheridan,   "  of  which  there  were   still  so  many  and 


252  DEAN    SWIFT 

living  witnesses  in  that  kingdom,  and  in  which  the 
whole  body  of  Protestants  suffered  so  much,  came 
first  into  their  minds,  and  raised  the  utmost  abhor- 
rence of  all  who  were  supposed  to  be  abettors 
of  such  a  measure.  They  were  taught  to  consider 
the  word  Tory  and  Jacobite  as  synonymous  terms, 
and  as  Swift  was  known  to  have  been  highly  in 
the  confidence  of  the  late  ministry,  he  was  of  course 
supposed  to  have  been  deeply  concerned  with  them 
in  the  plot  for  bringing  in  the  Pretender  :  being  the 
only  one  then  in  Ireland  against  whom  a  charge 
could  be  made  of  having  an  immediate  hand  in  such 
a  design,  he  became  the  chief  object  upon  which 
the  madness  of  party  vented  its  rage."  Feeling 
against  him  ran  so  high  apparently  that  he  was 
attacked  by  the  mob,  with  their  usual  methods,  and 
by  those  in  higher  circles  in  a  more  invidious 
manner.  There  is  one  record  or  petition  addressed 
by  him,  "To  the  Right  Honourable  the  Lords 
Spiritual  and  Temporal  in  Parliament  assembled," 
against  a  certain  nobleman  Lord  Blaney,  who  had 
arranged  a  violent  attack  on  him.  The  Petition 
shows  that  the  Dean  was  in  constant  danger  at  the 
hands  of  this  man,  who,  strangely  enough,  had 
received  considerable  help  from  him  some  years 
before.  Nothing  perhaps  hurt  Swift  so  much  as  the 
ingratitude  of  those  whom  he  helped.  He  was 
so  far  unpractical  that  he  expected  to  meet  with 
gratitude,  and  was  even  hurt  when  he  failed  to  find 
it.  As  he  gained  a  footing  in  Ireland  he  endeavoured 
to   carry   on   the   policy   which   he   had   adopted    in 


SWIFT   IN    IRFXAND  253 

England,  of  helping  all  who  stood  in  need  of  it. 
Thus,  both  in  England  and  Ireland,  he  was  of  use 
to  many  Whigs,  and  the  greater  was  his  chagrin  to 
find  that  he  was  treated  entirely  as  an  enemy  b}^ 
this  party  in  Ireland.  He  expressed  this  feeling  in 
a  letter  to  Archbishop  King:  "If  my  friendship  and 
conversation  were  equally  shewn  among  those  who 
liked  or  disapproved  the  proceeding  then  at  Court, 
and  that  I  was  known  to  be  a  common  friend  of  all 
deserving  persons  of  the  latter  sort,  when  they  were 
in  distress,  I  cannot  but  think  it  hard  that  I  am  not 
suffered  to  run  quietly  among  the  herd  of  people, 
whose  opinions  unfortunately  differ  from  those  which 
leaned  to  favour  and  preferment."  One  of  the  greatest 
hardships  arising  for  Swift  out  of  the  hostilitj''  to 
him  was  the  deprivation  of  the  friendship  of  many 
who  might  have  been  of  much  use  to  him  in  his  new 
position.  Thus  to  a  great  extent  he  was  cut  off  from 
society,  and  his  only  course  was  to  bury  himself 
within  the  duties  of  his  Deanery,  "  without  once 
casting  an  eye  towards  the  publick,"  says  Sheridan. 
In  a  letter  to  Pope,  in  the  year  1721,  Swift  wrote: 
"  In  a  few  weeks  after  the  loss  of  that  excellent 
Princess,  I  came  to  my  station  here,  where  1  have 
continued  ever  since  in  the  greatest  privacy,  and 
utter  ignorance  of  those  events  which  are  most 
commonly  talked  of  in  the  world.  I  neither  know 
the  names  or  number  of  the  family  which  now 
reigneth,  further  than  the  Prayer-book  informeth 
me.  I  cannot  tell  who  is  Chancellor,  who  are 
Secretaries,   nor  with  what  nation  we   are   in  peace 


254  DEAN   SWIFT 

or  war.     And  this  manner  of  life  was  not  taken  up 
out  of  any  sort  of  affectation,  but  merely  to  avoid 
giving  offence,  and  for  fear  of  provoking  party  zeal." 
He  had  time,  however,  to  think  of  his  former  friends. 
In   1715  he  wrote  to  Pope:  "You  know  how  well  I 
loved   both  Lord  Oxford  and  Bolingbroke,  and  how 
dear  the  Duke  of  Ormonde  is  to  me  :   and  do  you 
imagine    I    can    be    easy   while    their    enemies    are 
endeavouring  to   take   off  their  heads?      /  nunc  &> 
versus  tecum  meditare  canoros.     Do  you  imagine  I  can 
be  easy,  when  I  think  on  the  probable  consequences 
of  these  proceedings,  perhaps  upon  the  very  peace 
of  the  nation,  but  certainly  of  the  minds  of  so  many 
hundred    thousand    good    subjects?"      To    Gay   he 
writes :  "  I  was  three  years  reconciling  myself  to  the 
scene,  and  the  business,  to  which  fortune  hath  con- 
demned me,  and  stupidity  was  that  I  had  recourse 
to."     He  gives  a  depressing  account  of  himself     "  I 
would   describe   to  you   my  way   of   living,   if   any 
method  could  be  called  so  in  this  country.     I  choose 
my  companions   among  those   of  least   consequence 
and  most  compliance  :  I  read  the  most  trifling  books 
I   can  find,  and  when  I  write,  it  is  upon   the   most 
trifling  subjects :   but   riding,  walking  and   sleeping 
take  up  eighteen  of  the  twenty-four  hours;   I  pro- 
crastinate  more   than   I   did   twenty  years  ago,  and 
have   several   things   to   finish,   which   I   put    off   to 
twenty    years    hence."      The  warning  which    Swift 
uttered  at  the  end  of  these  seven  years  of  unwilling 
retirement  testified  to  the  benefit  which  he  received. 
Perhaps,    too,   the   energies   allowed   to   slumber   in 


SWIFT   IN    IRELAND  255 

these  years  culminated  in  "  Gulliver's  Travels."  We 
cannot,  therefore,  be  altogether  dissatisfied,  though 
the  thought  of  this  enforced  inactivity  brings  with 
it  much  sadness.  It  is  an  unnatural  thing  for  a 
thoroughly  able  man  to  be  compelled,  except  through 
illness,  to  take  a  period  of  seven  years  out  of  his 
life  apparently  for  no  purpose  whatever.  We  must, 
to  some  extent,  consider  as  lost  these  years  of  Swift's 
life.  Their  record  is  to  be  found  in  the  trifles 
which  he  wrote  to  Dr.  Sheridan  and  in  the  more 
serious  letters  to  Oxford  and  others  of  his  English 
circle,  among  whom  were  numbered  Bolingbroke, 
Addison,  Arbuthnot,  Prior,  Pope,  Lewis,  the  Duchess 
of  Ormonde,  and  Lady  Bolingbroke.  That  all  his 
thoughts  were  centred  in  them  we  have  very  decided 
testimony  in  his  letters.  In  171 5  he  wrote  to  Oxford 
imploring  him  to  allow  him  to  be  with  him  in  prison. 
"  My  lord,  it  may  look  like  an  idle  or  officious  thing 
in  me,  to  give  your  Lordship  any  interruption  under 
your  present  circumstances ;  yet  I  could  never  forgive 
myself,  if,  after  having  been  treated  for  several  years 
with  the  greatest  kindness  and  distinction,  by  a  person 
of  your  Lordship's  virtue,  I  should  omit  making  you 
at  this  time  the  humblest  offers  of  my  poor  service 
and  attendance.  It  is  the  first  time  I  ever  solicited 
you  in  my  own  behalf;  and  if  I  am  refused,  it  will  be 
the  first  request  you  ever  refused  me."  Oxford  could 
not,  however,  take  advantage  of  this  offer.  He  wrote, 
therefore,  on  being  released  from  the  Tower  in  17 17  : — 
"  Two  years'  retreat  has  made  me  taste  the  conversa- 
tion of  my  dearest  friend,  with  a  greater  relish  than 


2S6  DEAN    SWIFT 

even  at  the  time  of  my  being  charmed  with  it  in  our 
frequent  journeys  to  Windsor.  My  heart  is  often 
with  you,  but  I  delayed  writing  in  expectation  of 
giving  a  perfect  answer  about  my  going  to  Brampton, 
but  the  truth  is  the  warmth  of  rejoicing  in  these  parts 
is  so  far  from  abating,  that  I  am  persuaded  by  my  » 
friends  to  go  up  to  Cambridgeshire,  where  you  are 
too  just  not  to  believe  you  will  be  welcome  before 
any  one  in  the  world.  The  longing  your  friends 
have  to  see  you  must  be  submitted  to  the  judgment 
yourself  makes  of  all  circumstances.  At  present  this 
seems  to  be  a  cooler  climate  than  your  island  is  like 
to  be  when  they  assemble,  etc.  Our  impatience  to 
see  you  should  not  draw  you  into  uneasiness.  We 
long  to  embrace  you,  if  you  find  it  may  be  of  no 
inconvenience  to  yourself.  "  Oxford." 

Bolingbroke  wrote  to  him  in  a  letter  which  has 
been  quoted  in  another  connection.  "  I  know  not 
whether  the  love  of  fame  increases  as  we  advance  in 
age ;  sure  I  am  that  the  force  of  friendship  does.  I 
loved  you  almost  twenty  years  ago;  I  thought  of 
you  as  well  as  I  do  now,  better  was  beyond  the 
power  of  conception." 

He  was  distressed  at  this  time  by  the  account  of 
Prior's  misfortunes,  and  did  everything  possible  to 
promote  a  design  for  publishing  his  works  by  sub- 
scription. As  Sheridan  sententiously  remarks :  "  What 
an  instance  is  here  of  the  vicissitudes  in  human 
affairs,  when  a  man  who  had  been  Ambassador 
Plenipotentiary  to  the  Court  of  France  should,  in  the 


Z   Z 

r.    < 


3 


5  s 


SWIFT   IN    IRELAND  257 

space  of  a  few  years,  be  reduced  to  such  a  sorry 
expedient  (as  Swift  terms  it)  to  keep  him  above 
want."  He  also  occupied  himself  at  this  time  with 
two  pamphlets  on  behalf  of  the  late  ministry.  One 
was  "Memoirs  relating  to  that  change  which 
happened  in  the  Queen's  Ministry  in  the  year  17 10." 
The  other  "An  Enquiry  into  the  behaviour  of  the 
Queen's  last  Ministry,  with  relation  to  their  quarrels 
among  themselves,  and  the  design  charged  upon 
them  of  altering  the  succession  of  the  Crown."  By 
these  two  treatises  he  wished  to  expose  the  main 
springs  of  Government  procedure  during  that  time, 
and  to  exonerate  them  from  the  charge,  now  so  loudly 
bruited,  of  a  design  to  bring  back  the  Pretender. 
No  doubt  they  were  very  effective  in  putting  the  late 
Government  on  a  better  footing ;  they  are  valuable 
to  us  because  they  constitute  the  whole  of  Swift's 
serious  literary  output  during  these  seven  years. 

In  the  3'ear  172 1,  however,  his  period  of  retire- 
ment came  to  an  end.  He  had  established  his  posi- 
tion, and  there  was  no  longer  any  real  danger  of  an 
attack  upon  him  on  party  questions.  During  this 
time  he  was  meditating  on  a  project  which  he  accom- 
plished a  few  years  later.  Injustice  of  any  kind  was 
always  sufficient  to  arouse  in  Swift  a  feeling  of 
indignation  and  generally  an  expression  of  it.  Thus 
the  fact  that  the  Irish  were  suffering  from  most 
unjust  oppression  at  the  hands  of  England,  was  con- 
sidered by  Swift  a  sufficient  motive  for  action. 
Though  he  hated  his  fellow  countrymen,  as  we  must 
call  them,  yet  their  wrongs  could  wring  from   him 


258  DEAN   SWIFT 

expressions  of  the  deepest  sympathy,  and  could 
make  him  conduct  on  their  behalf  a  crusade  against 
abstract  injustice,  and  concrete  English  tyranny. 

England's  attitude  towards  Ireland  was  then,  as 
it  is  now,  inexplicable.  Unjust  hatred  of  a  people 
too  generous  to  return  it,  jealousy  of  the  natural 
rights  of  that  people,  and  probably  the  rankling  sense 
of  the  inferiority  of  the  English  character,  stirred  the 
English  nation  to  open  hostility  against  the  Irish. 
It  is  a  paradox  to  assert  that  it  is  a  religious  hatred. 
England's  attitude  to  Ireland  was  the  attitude  of  the 
governing  class  to  a  subject  race,  with  elements  of 
smallness  in  it  unworthy  of  a  dominant  people.  It 
can  only  be  illustrated  by  the  fable  of  the  dog  in  the 
manger.  It  was  more  true  of  England  then  than  it 
is  now. 

In  the  year  1721  Swift  began  his  Irish  campaign, 
no  doubt  greatly  to  the  annoyance  of  the  English 
Government,  who  looked  on  him  as  safely  occupied 
over  the  water.  In  that  year  he  published  his  first 
political  tract  on  behalf  of  Ireland  entitled,  "A  pro- 
posal for  the  Universal  use  of  Irish  manufactures." 
In  this  he  carefully  avoided  touching  on  party 
matters,  and  pointed  out  that  the  remedy  against 
their  distress  was  in  the  hands  of  the  Irish  them- 
selves. It  was  sufficient  to  cause  instant  alarm  in 
England,  as  Swift  himself  wrote  to  Pope.  "I  have 
written  in  this  kingdom,  a  discourse  to  persuade  the 
wretched  people  to  wear  their  own  manufactures, 
instead  of  those  from  England.  This  treatise  soon 
spread  very  fast,  being  agreeable  to  the  sentiments 


SWIFT   IN    IRELAND  259 

of  the  whole  nation,  except  of  those  gentlemen  who 
had  employments,  or  were  expectant.     Upon  which 
a  person  of  great  office  here,  immediately  took  the 
alarm ;  he   sent   in   haste  for   the  Chief  Justice,  and 
informed  him  of  a  seditious,  factious,  and  virulent 
pamphlet,  lately  published  with  a  design  of  setting 
the  two  kingdoms  at  variance ;  directing  at  the  same 
time  that  the  printer  should  be  prosecuted  with  the 
utmost  rigour  of  the  law.     The  Chief  Justice  has  so 
quick  an  understanding  that  he  resolved,  if  possible, 
to  outdo  his  orders.     The  grand  juries  of  the  country 
and  city  were  effectually  practised  with,  to  represent 
the  said  pamphlet  with  all  aggravating  epithets,  for 
which  they  had  thanks  sent  them  from  England,  and 
their  presentments  published,  for  several  weeks,  in 
all    the    newspapers.     The   printer   was   seized,   and 
forced  to  give  great  bail.     After  his  trial,  the  Jury 
brought  him  in  Not  Guilty,  although  they  had  been 
culled  with  the  utmost  industry  :  the  Chief  Justice 
sent   them   back   nine   times,  and  kept   them  eleven 
hours,   until,   being    perfectly   tired   out,   they   were 
forced  to  leave  the  matter  to  the  mercy  of  the  Judge, 
by  what  they  call  a  special  verdict.     During  the  trial 
the  Chief  Justice,  among  other  singularities,  laid  his 
hand  on  his  breast,  and  protested  solemnly  that  the 
Author's    design   was    to    bring    in    the    Pretender, 
although  there  was  not  a  single  syllable  of  party  in 
the  whole  treatise;  and  although  it  was  known  that 
the  most  eminent  of  those  who  possessed  his  own 
principles,  publicly  disallowed  his  proceedings.     But 
the  cause  being  so  very  odious  and  unpopular,  the 


26o  DEAN   SWIFT 

trial  of  the  verdict  was  deferred  from  one  term  to 
another,  until  upon  the  Duke  of  Grafton's,  the  Lord 
Lieutenant's,  arrival,  his  Grace,  after  mature  advice 
and  permission  from  England  was  pleased  to  grant 
a  Noli  prosequi''' 

This  outburst  was  sufficient  to  show  Swift  that 
the  embers  of  party  feeling  were  only  smouldering, 
and  he  withdrew  into  his  former  retirement  after 
exposing  the  Chief  Justice.  Yet,  as  Sheridan  aptly 
puts  it,  "His  heart  was  constantly  crowded  with 
the  scenes  of  misery  which  surrounded  him  :  and 
his  patriotic  spirit  thus  confined,  proved  only  as 
an  evil  one  to  torment  him."  Swift's  attitude  at  this 
time  is  characteristically  illustrated  by  Dr.  Delany. 
He  tells  the  story  of  a  call  which  he  paid  on  Swift 
one  day,  when  he  was  asked  "'whether  the  corrup- 
tions and  villainies  of  men  in  power  did  not  eat  his 
flesh  and  exhaust  his  spirits  ? ' "  Was  answered, 
"That  in  truth  they  did  not,"  He  then  asked  in  a 
fury,  "  Why — why,  how  can  you  help  it  ?  How  can 
you  avoid  it?"  Delany  calmly  replied,  "Because  I 
am  commanded  to  the  contrary.  Fret  not  thyself 
because  of  the  tingodly." 

Probably  the  literary  sterility  of  this  period  was 
due  partly  to  the  fact  that  at  this  time  Swift  was 
in  great  difficulties  owing  to  the  importunity  of 
Miss  Vknhomrigh.  For  three  years  she  kept  up 
a  continual  series  of  attacks  on  him.  Her  death  in 
the  year  1723  removed  from  his  path  the  woman 
who,  by  the  mischief  of  which  she  was  capable,  was  a 
constant  source  of  danger  to  his  happiness  and  that 


SWIFT   IN    IRELAND  261 

of  Stella.  It  is  impossible  to  lament  her  death.  Let 
those  sentimentalists  grieve  who  see  in  every  man  an 
artful  villain  with  designs  on  a  woman's  honour 
and  happiness,  and  in  every  sentimental  woman  an 
injured  saint.     We  cannot. 

The  time  has  now  come  for  Swift's  coup  d'etat 
in  Ireland. 

As  in  estimating  Swift's  influence  on  English 
politics  an  account  of  the  general  condition  of  the 
country  and  of  her  place  in  European  politics  was 
necessary,  so  a  sketch,  however  brief,  of  Ireland  at 
this  period,  is  essential  to  the  comprehension  of  his 
work  there. 

The  union  with  Scotland  had  brought  about  a 
permanent  reconcilement  of  our  old  antagonism  with 
that  country.  There  were  wars  and  rumours  of 
wars  down  to  1745,  but  the  union  has  never  since 
been  in  any  serious  way  in  jeopardy.  Prof.  Seeley 
considers  this  was  and  has  been  due  to  the  fact  that 
when  the  Union  was  under  discussion  Scotland  had 
somewhat  wherewithal  to  treat.  In  1703,  the  Act 
of  Security  had  provided  that  Scotland  was  not 
under  the  necessity  of  accepting  the  successor  of 
Queen  Anne  as  sovereign  of  Scotland,  "unless  there 
be  such  condition  of  Government  settled  and  enacted 
as  may  secure  the  honour  and  sovereignty  of  this 
crown  and  kingdom,  the  freedom,  frequency  and 
power  of  parliament,  the  religion,  freedom  and  trade 
of  the  nation  from  English  or  any  foreign  influence." 

Since  the  union  with  Scotland  was  all  essential 
if   the    North    was    not    to   become   the    permanent 


262  DEAN   SWIFT 

home  of  Jacobitism,  that  country  was  in  1707  granted 
commercial  equality.  Had  some  farseeing  statesmen 
adopted  the  same  course  in  Ireland — the  history 
of  our  relations  with  that  country  during  the  past 
200  years  might  have  been  strangely  different. 
Commercial  jealousy  had  in  the  one  case  to  give 
way  to  political  necessity — in  the  other  political 
necessity  decided  to  use  commercial  jealousy  as  a 
means  whereby  it  could  free  itself  from  its  difficulties. 
And  the  difficulties  were  these :  Ireland  professed 
the  creed  of  the  rival  claimant  to  the  English  throne, 
she  had  been  in  open  rebellion  against  the  Revolu- 
tion settlement,  and  her  trade  was  in  rivalry  with 
that  of  the  English  producer.  She  must  be  put 
under  close  restraint.  It  was  no  new  policy  towards 
Ireland,  but  from  1699  onwards  it  was  pursued  with 
ferocious  vindictiveness.  In  1663  Ireland  had  been 
excluded  from  the  Navigation  Act,  and  no  Irish 
cattle  or  dairy  produce  were  allowed  an  entrance 
to  the  English  market,  nor  could  colonial  produce 
be  imported  into  Ireland  save  through  an  English 
port.  Ireland,  in  despair,  had  turned  to  sheep-rear- 
ing— thereupon,  in  1699,  the  English  Parliament 
prohibited  the  export  of  Irish  wool  to  any  foreign 
country,  and  imposed  a  prohibitive  tariff  at  the  few 
English  ports  where  entrance  was  allowed.  The 
result  was  a  huge  exodus  from  the  country,  twenty 
to  thirty  thousand  were  thrown  on  charity.  The 
moral  effect  upon  the  country  was  to  produce 
apathy.  The  Irish  Catholics  constituted  three 
quarters    ol    the    population,    and    were    devoid    of 


SWIFT   IN    IRELAND  263 

all  political  and  civil  rights.  They  could  hold  no 
military  or  civil  office,  they  must  not  possess 
arms,  or  a  horse  worth  more  than  £i.  Catholic 
education  and  the  presence  of  bishops  were 
prohibited.  Added  to  this,  one-third  of  the  rental 
was  spent  out  of  the  country  by  absentee  landlords. 
Absenteeism  was  no  new  trouble  in  Ireland. 
Richard  II.  and  Henry  VIII.  had  both  legislated 
against  it,  but  to  such  an  extent  had  it  grown  in 
the  eighteenth  Century  that  even  office-holders 
were  absentees,  and  place-hunting  was  so  flagrant 
that,  as  Swift  remarked,  bad  as  England  was  in 
this  respect,  it  was  "a  kingdom  of  saints  as  compared 
to  Ireland.  We  are  slaves  and  knaves,  and  all 
but  bishops  and  people  in  employment,  beggars. 
The  few  honest  men  among  us  are  dead-hearted, 
poor,  and  out  of  favour  and  power." 

The  condition  of  the  Anglican  Church  in  Ireland 
was  deplorable.  The  Bishops,  who  possessed  one- 
nineteenth  of  the  whole  soil,  were  wealthy,  but  only 
too  frequently  absentee.  The  clergy  were  miserably 
poor,  their  livings,  even  when  plural,  rarely  exceeding 
^100  a  year.  For  the  most  part  the  Bishops  were 
Whigs  and  the  parsons  Tories.  Only  one-third  of 
the  non-Catholics  were  Anglicans,  but  the  Test  Act 
of  1703  shut  out  all  others  from  power. 

The  condition  of  the  peasantry  may  be  read  in 
Swift's  own  pamphlet,  "A  short  view  of  the  State 
of  Ireland."  He  begins  the  pamphlet  with  an 
enumeration  of  fourteen  things  which  go  towards 
the   making  of  a  prosperous  country,  and    all  who 


264  DEAN   SWIFT 

have  the  interest  of  Ireland  at  heart  should  carefully 
read  them  and  consider  how  far  their  adoption 
would  not  result  in  a  happier  Ireland  to-day.  "Any 
traveller,"  he  says,  "  coming  to  Ireland  might  imagine 
himself,  from  the  poverty  of  the  people,  in  Lapland 
or  Iceland.  Desolation  reigns  supreme,  the  old 
seats  of  the  nobility  in  ruins ;  farmers  and  their 
families  who  pay  heavy  rents  live  in  filth  and  nasti- 
ness."  One  of  the  popular  ideas  in  England  about 
Ireland  was  that  it  was  a  rich  country,  largely  due  to 
the  fact  that  a  round  million  made  its  way  to  England 
with  no  expenditure  on  her  part,  and  to  the  presence 
of  wealthy  bankers  who  bled  the  country  of  the  little 
gold  it  possessed  ;  "  they  have  sent  away  all  our  silver 
and  one-third  of  our  gold."  When  guests  come  from 
England  they  mostly  stay  with  rich  folk,  and  "  go 
home  and  report  that  we  wallow  in  riches  and  luxury. 
Yet  I  confess  I  have  known  an  hospital  where  all  the 
household  officers  grew  rich,  while  the  poor,  for 
whose  sake  it  was  built,  were  almost  starving  for 
want  of  food  and  raiment." 

Lecky,  quoting  from  the  Southwell  correspondence, 
says  that  in  1702  so  poor  were  the  towns  that  it  was 
feared  the  court  mourning  for  William  III.  would  be 
the  last  blow. 

"  The  poor,"  says  Sheridan,  "  are  sunk  to  the  lowest 
degrees  of  misery  and  poverty,  their  houses  dung- 
hills, their  victuals  the  blood  of  their  cattle,  or  the 
herbs  of  the  field."  Blood  and  sorrel  were  boiled  up 
together.  Burdy  gives  a  case  where  a  man,  to  feed 
his  wife  and  children,  bled  his  neighbour's  cattle. 


SWIFT   IN    IRELAND  265 

Further,  the  country  was  embittered  by  the  intense 
hatred  shown  to  one  another  by  the  rival  sects  and 
churches,  by  Whigs  and  Tories.  Swift  says,  "There 
is  hardly  a  Whig  in  Ireland  who  would  allow  a  potato 
and  butter-milk  to  a  reputed  Tory."  Discord  reigned 
supreme  where  co-operation  was  of  the  first  import- 
ance. The  misery  of  it  all  entered  like  a  hot  iron  into 
Swift's  very  soul.  "  It  fevered  his  blood,  it  broke  his 
rest,  it  drove  him  at  times  half  frantic  with  furious 
indignation,  it  sunk  him  at  times  in  abysses  of  sullen 
despondency,  it  awoke  in  him  emotions  which  in 
ordinary  men  are  seldom  excited  save  by  personal 
injuries." 

For  seven  years  after  his  arrival  in  Ireland,  re- 
garded as  a  Jacobite,  sometimes  in  fear  of  arrest,  he 
lay  quiet,  fulfilling  his  duties  as  Dean  of  St.  Patrick's. 

During  those  seven  years  a  national  party  in  Ire- 
land had  gradually  come  into  existence.  It  had  little 
coherence,  but  to  gain  this  it  only  required,  as  the 
Tory  party  in  England  years  before,  a  strong  leader 
and  a  powerful  pen.  The  English  ministry  under 
Walpole,  bent  on  extirpating  in  Ireland  every  trace  of 
national  feeling  and  independence,  had  embarked  upon 
a  policy  of  "thorough."  They  would  rule  Ireland  by 
means  of  an  English  clique  established  in  Dublin. 
The  Irish  Church,  a  stronghold  of  Toryism,  must  be 
weakened.  For  this  purpose  they  brought  forward 
in  the  Irish  Parliament  a  bill  granting  toleration  to 
Presbyterians.  It  passed  the  Council  only  by  the 
Lord-Lieutenant's  casting  vote.  It  passed,  said  the 
Archbishop  of  Dublin  (King),  by  the  votes  of  "our 


266  DEAN   SWIFT 

brethren  lately  sent  us  out  of  England."  In  the  same 
year  the  Appellate  Jurisdiction  of  the  Irish  House  of 
Peers  was  taken  away.  By  the  governing  clique  the 
Irish  gentry  were  treated  with  absolute  contempt. 

In  1720  the  country  awoke  at  last  from  its  sleep 
and,  sinking  smaller  differences,  united  in  an  endeavour 
to  throw  off  restrictions  on  legislation  and  on  trade. 
Swift  threw  himself  heart  and  soul  into  the  work.  His 
campaign,  as  has  been  previously  stated,  opened  with 
a  pamphlet  entitled,  "A  proposal  for  the  Universal 
use  of  Irish  manufactures  in  cloathes  and  furniture  of 
houses,  and  utterly  rejecting  and  renouncing  every- 
thing wearable  that  comes  from  England."  Its  object 
is  sufTficiently  indicated  by  its  title.  If  the  Irish 
might  not  export  their  produce,  let  them  use  it  them- 
selves and  "  burn  everything  that  came  from  England 
except  coals  and  the  people."  "  Let  a  firm  resolution 
be  taken  by  male  and  female,  never  to  appear  with 
one  single  shred  that  comes  from  England,  and  let  all 
the  people  say  Amen."  The  Scripture  tells  us  "that 
oppression  makes  a  wise  man  mad.  Therefore  conse- 
quently speaking  the  reason  why  some  men  are  not 
mad  is  because  they  are  not  wise.  However,  it  were 
to  be  wished  that  oppression  would  in  time  teach  a 
little  wisdom  to  fools."  The  whole  country  is  suffer- 
ing from  tyranny,  the  landlord  himself  is  a  slave. 
"  Slaves  have  a  natural  disposition  to  be  tyrants,  and 
when  my  betters  give  me  a  kick  I  am  apt  to  revenge 
it  with  six  upon  my  footman,  although,  perhaps,  he 
may  be  an  honest  and  diligent  fellow."  Universal 
oppression  prevailed.    "  Whoever  travels  this  country 


SWIFT   IN    IRELAND  267 

and  observes  the  force  of  nature,  or  the  faces,  habits 
and  dwellings  of  the  natives,  will  hardly  think  himself 
in  a  land  where  law,  religion  or  common  humanity,  is 
professed."  Swift  was  not  blind  to  the  faults  of  the 
Irish  farmer  and  peasant.  How  they  wore  out  their 
ground  by  over  ploughing,  and  took  no  care  to  manure 
as  they  ought,  and  how  when  they  found  their  leases 
were  not  to  be  renewed,  they  would  plough  up  the 
very  meadows.  The  land  being  exhausted,  was  given 
over  to  grazing,  so  that  a  few  herdsmen  got  the  liveli- 
hood of  one  hundred  men.  Hence  the  importation  of 
corn  from  England,  and  wool  a  drug  in  the  Irish 
market.  And  yet  he  defends  the  Irishman  from  the  1 
charge  so  often  still  brought  against  him  of  laziness.  \ 
"  You  can't  call  a  man  lazy  if  he  can  find  nothing  to  . 
do."  The  pamphlet  was  a  long,  bitterly  sarcastic 
exposure  of  Irish  wrongs.  The  Government  was 
incensed,  and  at  once  instituted  proceedings  against 
the  printer.  The  jury  refused  to  find  him  guilty  of 
publishing  a  seditious,  factious  and  virulent  pamphlet. 
One  of  the  many  grievances  under  which  Ireland 
suffered  was  the  granting  of  patents  to  coin  copper 
money  to  private  individuals.  Scotland  had  its  own 
mint,  which  was  specially  provided  for  in  the  Act  of 
Union.  To  Ireland,  in  spite  of  her  frequent  appeals 
for  a  mint,  from  which  could  be  issued  coins  of  the 
same  standard  and  intrinsic  value  as  those  used  in 
England,  this  right  iwas  denied.  In  1705  one,  Knox, 
to  whom  the  patent  had  been  granted  for  twenty-one 
years,  sold  his  right  to  a  certain  Colonel  Moore,  who 
forthwith  flooded  the  country  with   copper  money. 


268  DEAN    SWIFT 

In  1720,  whether  owing  to  a  scarcity  of  copper  as 
some  assert  or  to  an  absence  of  silver,  it  was  quite 
certain  that  there  was  very  little  small  change  in 
circulation.  The  memorial  which  was  presented  to 
the  Lords  of  the  Treasury  and  upon  which  they 
acted,  complains  only  of  the  condition  of  the  copper 
coinage,  and  of  the  evils  of  private  minting.  The 
position  is  made  quite  clear  by  the  following  extract 
from  Archbishop  King's  letter. 

"As  to  our  wanting  halfpence  for  change,  it  is 
most  false,  we  have  more  halfpence  than  we  need 
already  ;  it  is  true  we  want  change,  but  it  is  sixpences, 
shillings,  half-crowns,  our  silver  and  our  guineas 
being  almost  gone.  The  general  coin  of  the  country 
being  magdores,  which  are  thirty  shillings  a  piece — at 
least  ninepence  above  the  value  in  silver — they  would 
now  have  us  change  them  for  halfpence,  and  so  the 
whole  cash  of  the  kingdom  would  be  these  half- 
pence." 

The  attempt  evidently  was  to  impose  a  copper 
coinage  on  Ireland.  The  patent,  which  was  to  hold 
good  for  fourteen  years,  was  granted  to  the  Duchess 
of  Kendal,  the  reigning  favourite,  and  she  sold  it  to 
Wood  for  ;^io,ooo  and  perhaps  a  share  in  the  profits. 
This  was  one  of  Walpole's  little  jobs.  Wood  had  the 
right  to  issue  ^108,000  worth  of  farthings  and  half- 
pence. The  amount  was  ludicrous,  as  the  whole 
circulating  medium  of  Ireland  was  at  this  time  under 
half  a  million  sterling,  and  it  was  suspected  that 
Wood  would  increase  his  profits  by  debasing  the 
coinage.     In  any  case  Ireland's  scanty  store  of  gold 


SWIFT   IN    IRELAND  269 

and    silver  would    be    lost,   and   foreign    exchanges 
would  be  turned  against  the  country. 

The  Commissioners  of  Revenue  in  Dublin  at  once 
took  alarm,  and  memorialized  the  Lord-Lieutenant 
that  "such  a  patent  would  be  highly  prejudicial  to 
the  trade  and  welfare  of  this  kingdom  and  more 
particularly  to  his  Majesty's  Revenue,  which  they 
had  found  to  have  suffered  very  much  by  too  great 
a  quantity  of  such  base  coin."  As  no  reply  was 
forthcoming,  they  memorialized  the  Lords  of  the 
Treasury,  adding  to  the  above  that  "there  did  not 
appear  the  least  want  of  such  small  pieces  of  coin  for 
change."  To  this  there  was  no  reply,  and  Wood's 
money  began  to  arrive. 

The  Irish  House  of  Parliament  next  took  up  the 
matter,  declared  that  in  the  first  place  the  money  was 
not  required,  and  that  it  was  debased.  Moreover,  it 
was  highly  prejudicial  to  make  these  grants  to  private 
persons  or  corporations. 

To  these  resolutions  Walpole  was  bound  to  pay 
attention,  and  a  Committee  of  the  Privy  Council  was 
appointed  to  inquire  into  the  coinage. 

Before  they  had  time  to  issue  their  report  Swift 
had  raised  the  whole  country  in  revolt.  Out  came 
the  famous  Drapier  letters,  the  first  addressed  to  the 
shopkeepers  and  common  people  in  Ireland,  ^'very 
proper  to  be  kept  in  every  family"  in  which  he  urged 
them  to  refuse  to  accept  Mr.  Wood's  brass  halfpence. 
The  collectors  of  the  King's  customs  had  refused  this 
money,  all  the  kingdom  must  abominate  it.  As  for 
himself  he  intends  to  revert  to  barter  rather  than  use 


270  DEAN   SWIFT 

it.  "These  blood-suckers  will  suck  all  the  good 
money  out  of  the  country.  And  yet  the  tenants  of 
this  country  are  bound  by  their  leases  to  pay  sterling, 
which  is  lawful  current  money  of  England.  You  will 
all  be  undone  if  you  be  so  foolish  and  wicked  as  to 
take  this  cursed  coin.  The  laws  have  not  given  the 
Crown  a  power  of  forcing  the  subjects  to  take  what 
money  the  king  pleases — for  then  we  might  be  bound 
to  take  pebble  stones  or  cockle-shells.  By  the  law  of 
England,  according  to  my  Lord  Coke,  no  subject  can 
be  forced  to  take  any  money  but  of  lawful  metal,  i.e. 
of  silver  and  gold ;  therefore,  my  friends,  stand  to  it 
one  and  all,  refuse  this  filthy  trash.  It  is  no  treason 
to  rebel  against  Mr.  Wood." 

The  effect  of  this  pamphlet  was  instantaneous ; 
from  Cork  to  Londonderry,  from  Galway  to  Dublin, 
Ireland  was  in  a  blaze. 

Then  the  news  leaked  out  that  the  Government 
intended  a  compromise,  that  Wood  was  not  to  issue 
more  than  ;,^40,ooo,  that  legal  tender  was  to  be  fixed 
at  5i^.  The  report  of  the  assayists  had  been  sent 
in.  The  assay,  however,  had  been  made  only  on  those 
coins  issued  between  March,  1723-1724,  and  these 
coins  had  never  been  uttered  in  Ireland ;  even  so 
they  had  reported  that  "although  the  copper  was 
very  good  and  the  money  one  piece  with  another 
was  full  weight,  yet  the  single  pieces  were  not  so 
equally  coined  in  the  weight  as  they  should  have 
been."  This  last  sentence  was  suppressed  in  the 
Report  of  the  Privy  Council.  We  can  well  imagine 
that  Swift  was   fairl}'^  accurate  when   he   denounced 


SWIFT   IN    IRP:LAND  271 

the  money  which  really  reached  Ireland,  as  brass. 
And  yet  Swift  has  been  roundly  accused  by  Mr. 
Birkbeck  Hill  of  lying  when  he  denounced  the  coin 
as  being  base. 

The  real  point,  however,  at  issue  was  not  a 
financial  one  but,  as  Mr.  Churton  Collins  points  out, 
political.  "  Nothing  can  be  more  certain  than  that 
it  was  Swift's  design  from  the  very  beginning  to 
make  the  controversy  with  Wood  the  basis  of  far 
more  extensive  operations."  It  had  furnished  him 
with  the  means  of  waking  Ireland  from  lethargy 
into  fiery  life.  He  looked  to  it  to  furnish  him  with 
the  means  of  raising  her  from  servitude  to  inde- 
pendence, from  ignominy  to  honour.  Would  that 
spirit  be  prematurely  quenched  when  the  news  of 
the  compromise  arrived?  The  spark  must  not  be 
quenched,  the  second  Drapier  letter  appeared  to 
counteract  the  effect  of  the  Report  which  was  shortly 
to  reach  Dublin.  In  it  "he  tore  the  whole  case  of 
his  opponents  to  shreds  with  a  skill  that  would  have 
done  honour  to  Demosthenes."  We  cannot  do  more 
here  than  glance  at  this  pamphlet,  masterly  as  it  is, 
but  a  few  extracts  must  be  given.  In  the  compromise 
Wood  had  promised  to  coin  no  more  than  ^40,000 
worth,  "unless  the  exigencies  of  trade  require  it, 
to  which  if  I  were  to  answer,  it  would  be  thus.  Let 
Mr.  Wood  and  his  crew  of  founders  and  tinkers 
coin  on  until  there  is  not  an  old  kettle  left  in  the 
kingdom :  let  them  coin  old  leather,  tobacco  pipes, 
clay  or  dirt  in  the  streets,  and  call  their  trumpery 
what   they  please  from  a  guinea   to  a   farthing,    we 


272  DEAN   SWIFT 

are  not  under  any  concern  to  know  how  he  and 
his  tribe  of  accomplices  think  fit  to  employ  them- 
selves. We  are  determined  not  to  use  his  ware. 
This  little  arbitrary  mock  monarch  most  graciously 
offers  to  take  our  manufactures  in  exchange,  to 
remove  our  direful  apprehensions  that  he  will  drain 
us  of  gold  and  silver.  Is  not  this  just  what  we 
complain  of?  His  cursed  project  will  put  us  under 
the  necessity  of  selling  our  goods  for  what  is  equal 
to  nothing.  When  he  talks  of  exigencies  of  trade 
he  must  mean  his  own  :  this  poor  little  kingdom 
is  never  consulted  ...  a  whole  kingdom  is  being 
kept  in  awe,  not  by  plague  or  a  famine,  not  by  a 
tyrannical  prince,  but  by  one  single,  diminutive, 
insignificant  mechanic.  ...  It  is  no  dishonour  to 
submit  to  the  lion,  but  who,  with  the  figure  of  a 
man,  can  think  with  patience  of  being  devoured 
alive  by  a  rat  ?  " 

Then  we  get  a  sentence  in  which  Swift  shows 
his  true  goal.  "  If  his  copper  were  diamonds  and 
the  kingdom  were  entirely  against  it,  would  not 
that  be  sufficient  to  reject  it  ?  " 

This  theme  he  develops  in  the  third  letter, 
addressed  to  the  nobility  and  gentry  of  Ireland. 
"Supposing,"  he  says,  "such  a  dispute  had  arisen 
in  England  and  the  Houses  of  Parliament  and  the 
Privy  Council  there  had  besought  his  Majesty  to 
recall  such  a  patent,  would  any  minister  dare  advise 
him  against  recalling  such  a  patent?  Were  not 
the  people  of  Ireland  born  as  free  as  those  of 
England  ?    How  have  they  forfeited  their  freedom  ? 


SWIFT   IN    IRELAND  273 

Is  not  their  parliament  as  fair  a  representative  of 
the  people  as  that  of  England?  Are  they  not 
subjects  of  the  same  King?  Am  I  a  free  man  in 
England,  and  do  I  become  a  slave  in  six  hours  by 
crossing  the  Channel  ?  " 

In  the  fourth  letter  he  goes  still  further.  "  By 
the  laws  of  God,  of  Nature,  of  Nations,  and  of  your 
country,  you  are  and  ought  to  be  as  free  a  people 
as  your  brethren  in  England."  "All  government 
without  the  consent  of  the  governed  is  the  very 
definition  of  slavery."  The  letter  concludes  with 
a  piece  of  admirable  fooling. 

"Wood  has  written  that  'Mr.  Walpole  will  cram 
this  brass  down  our  throats — we  must  take  these 
halfpence  or  eat  our  brogues' — in  the  same  letter  we 
read  that  the  same  great  man  hath  sworn  to  make  us 
swallow  his  coin  in  fireballs  !  As  the  Scotchman  said 
when  he  heard  his  death  sentence  with  all  the  cir- 
cumstances of  hanging,  beheading,  quartering,  dis- 
embowellings  and  the  like,  '  What  need  of  all  this 
cookery?'  Here  is  a  dinner  getting  ready  for  us. 
There  must  be  some  mistake,  however;  for  instance, 
swallowing  their  halfpence  in  fireballs,  it  is  so  im- 
probable, for  to  execute  this  operation  the  whole 
stock  of  Mr.  Wood's  coin  and  metal  must  be  melted 
down  and  moulded  into  hollow  balls,  with  wild-fire, 
no  bigger  than  a  reasonable  throat  can  be  able  to 
swallow.  He  has  coined  fifty  million  ha'pence,  to 
be  swallowed  by  a  million  and  half  of  people,  so 
that,  allowing  two  ha'pence  to  each  ball,  there  will 
be  seventeen  balls  of  wild-fire  apiece,  to  be  swallowed 


274  DEAN   SWIFT 

by  every  person  in  this  kingdom,  and  to  administer 
this  dose  there  cannot  be  conveniently  fewer  than 
fifty  thousand  operators,  allowing  one  operator  to 
every  thirty,  which  considering  the  squeamishness 
of  some  stomachs  and  the  peevishness  of  young 
children  is  but  reasonable.  I  think  the  trouble  and 
charge  of  such  an  experiment  would  exceed  the 
profit." 

The  country  was  aflame ;  all  classes  banded  to- 
gether to  resist  Wood's  ha'pence  ;  the  very  newsboys 
refused  it.  They  were  on  the  rack,  as  Swift  said,  but 
they  claimed  the  liberty  of  roaring  as  loudly  as  they 
liked. 

Lord  Carteret,  who  had  arrived  to  replace  Grafton 
in  the  Lord-Lieutenancy,  was  obliged  to  take  action. 
Three  hundred  pounds  reward  was  offered  for  the 
discovery  of  the  author  of  this  wicked  and  malicious 
pamphlet.  There  was  no  doubt  of  the  authorship,  but 
the  Government  dared  not  touch  Swift.  He  was  the 
idol  of  the  people.  On  the  heels  of  the  proclamation 
the  following  placard  appeared  :  "And  the  people  said 
unto  Saul,  Shall  Jonathan  die,  who  hath  wrought 
this  great  salvation  in  Israel  ?  God  forbid :  as  the 
Lord  liveth,  there  shall  not  one  hair  of  his  head  fall 
to  the  ground ;  for  he  hath  wrought  with  God  this 
day.  So  the  people  rescued  Jonathan,  that  he  died 
not." 

Harding  the  printer  was  arrested  ;  twice  the  grand 
jury  threw  out  the  bill  against  him,  on  the  second 
occasion  presenting  Wood's  ha'pence  as  a  common 
nuisance.     Swift's  triumph  was   complete.     "  I  have 


SWIFT   IN    IRELAND  275 

his  Majesty's  commands  to  acquaint  you  that  an 
entire  end  is  put  to  the  patent  formerly  granted 
to  Mr.  Wood  ; "  so  spake  the  Viceroy  at  the  opening 
of  Parliament.  Medals  were  struck  in  Swift's  honour, 
his  birthday  was  kept  every  year  "with  tumultuous 
festivity,"  if  he  visited  a  town  for  the  first  time  he 
was  received  with  public  honours. 

But  during  this  time  he  was  busy  with  other 
matters  as  well ;  he  became  the  acknowledged  cham- 
pion of  the  Irish  clergy,  opposing  any  attempt  which 
the  Whig  bishops  made  at  their  expense  to  aggran- 
dize themselves.  He  fought  for  them  against  the 
aggression  of  their  landlords,  whilst  at  the  same  time 
he  was  earnest  in  all  matters  of  reform,  striving  to 
infuse  a  spirit  of  independence. 

England,  however,  was  determined  to  govern  • 
Ireland  by  Englishmen  in  the  interests  of  England 
and  Archbishop  Boulter,  of  Armagh,  the  Primate,! 
became  her  instrument,  bent  on  rooting  out  Catho- 
licism. Against  such  influence,  Swift  was  powerless, 
and  the  country  sank  further  and  further  into  the 
mire  of  misrule. 

In  1726,  Swift  paid  his  last  visit  to  England,  and 
interviewed  Walpole.  What  passed  is  not  known.  If, 
as  doubtless  he  did.  Swift  laid  before  him  his  opinions 
on  Ireland,  they  met  with  no  favour  from  Walpole. 
There  seems  to  have  been  some  offer  made  to  Swift, 
for  he  wrote  Sheridan :  "  I  have  had  the  fairest 
offer  made  me  of  settlement  here  that  one  can 
imagine  within  twelve  miles  of  London  in  the  midst 
of  my  friends,  but  I   am  too  old  for  new  schemes, 


276  DEAN    SWIFT 

especially  such  as  would  bridle  me  in  any  freedom." 
He  never  for  a  moment  allowed  self-interest  to  weigh 
against  duty  and  principle.  His  popularity  in  London 
was  great ;  both  parties  were  anxious  to  secure  his 
services.  Bolingbroke  and  Pulteny  on  the  one  hand, 
Walpole  on  the  other,  for  the  death  of  George  I.  was 
hourly  expected.  When  George  H.  ascended  the 
throne  and  Walpole  was  re-established.  Swift  quitted 
England  for  ever.  For  Ireland  the  same  misrule  was 
to  continue.  Swift's  influence  in  politics  was  at  an  end. 
Public  offices  were  filled  with  Englishmen,  bribery 
and  corruption  were  rampant  in  Parliament.  In  1729, 
after  three  bad  harvests,  a  terrible  famine  broke  out, 
and  the  people  died  in  thousands.  Swift  was  beside 
himself  with  indignation  at  the  apathy  of  England. 
The  Government,  to  get  rid  of  the  Roman  Catholic 
population  of  Ireland,  had  given  leave  to  the  King  of 
France  to  send  a  recruiting  officer  into  Ireland.  The 
scheme,  condemned  by  the  Craftsman,  received  Swift's 
ironical  support.  "An  Irishman  costs  as  much  as  five 
pounds  a  year  to  feed,  by  all  means  let  the  King  carry 
off  six  thousand ;  'twould  save  the  country  thirty  thou- 
sand a  year.  Let  him  take  thirty  thousand,  forty 
thousand,  fifty  thousand  ;  what  an  immense  benefit ! " 
In  the  same  strain  was  written  the  pamphlet  entitled 
"  A  modest  proposal  for  preventing  the  children  of 
Ireland  from  being  a  burden  to  their  parents  and 
country,  and  making  them  beneficial  to  the  '  public' 
Fatten  them  up  for  the  Dublin  market,  they  will  be 
delicious  roast,  baked  or  boiled."  "They  are  dying 
and  rotting  with  cold  and  famine,  let  the  landlords 


SWIFT   IN    IRELAND  277 

see  there  is  profit  to  be  made  out  of  them,  it  won't 
for  once  disoblige  England — as  such  a  commodity 
will  not  bear  exportation.  He  has  no  children 
of  his  own,  so  he  is  quite  disinterested,  he  says  in 
the  suggestion."  Perhaps  it  is  of  writing  such  as 
this  that  Lord  Morley  is  thinking  when  he  speaks 
of  Swift's  unholy  and  savage  genius.  The  terms 
would  be  applied  with  more  pertinence  to  the  system 
of  Government  which  could  drive  a  man  of  eminent 
kindness  of  disposition  to  such  a  paroxysm  of 
despair. 

They  say  he  hated  Ireland  "  where  all  were  either 
knaves  or  slaves."  Here  again  we  have  a  misconcep- 
tion. He  did  not  hate  Ireland  or  the  Irish,  what  he 
hated  was  the  tyranny  and  oppression  which  it  had 
become  so  utterl}/^  hopeless  to  alleviate.  Had  he  hated 
the  people  themselves  why  this  fierce  anger  at  their 
wrongs  ?  It  is  useless  to  quote  the  momentary  out- 
bursts of  anger  to  which  he  gave  way,  as  is  done  by 
some  even  of  his  most  sympathetic  biographers,  in  an 
attempt  to  prove  that  he  loathed  and  disdained  the 
Irish  themselves.  His  work  in  Dublin  city,  if  any 
proof  were  needed,  proves  the  contrary.  He 
regulated  mendicity  by  means  of  badges,  his  private 
charity  was  boundless  ;  "  he  never  went  abroad  with- 
out a  pocket  full  of  coins  which  he  distributed  among 
the  indigent  and  sick,  whom  he  regularly  visited."  "  I 
know,"  wrote  Lord  Carteret,  "  how  much  the  city  of 
Dublin  thinks  itself  under  your  protection  and  how 
strictly  they  used  to  obey  all  orders  fulminated  from 
the  sovereignty  of  St.  Patrick's." 


278  DEAN   SWIFT 

He  was  the  idol  of  the  people.  The  Hon.  John 
Wilson  Croker  thus  wrote  of  him :  "  Ireland 
worshipped  Swift  with  almost  Persian  idolatry. 
Sagacious  and  intrepid,  he  saw,  he  dared ;  above 
suspicion,  he  was  trusted ;  above  envy,  he  was  beloved  ; 
above  rivalry,  he  was  obeyed.  His  wisdom  was 
practical  and  prophetic,  remedial  for  the  present, 
warning  for  the  future :  he  first  taught  Ireland  that 
she  might  become  a  nation  and  England  that  she  must 
cease  to  be  a  despot.  But  he  was  a  Churchman.  His 
gown  impeded  his  course,  and  entangled  his  efforts ; 
guiding  a  senate,  or  heading  an  army,  he  had  been 
more  than  Cromwell,  and  Ireland  not  less  than 
England.  As  it  was  he  saved  her  by  his  courage, 
improved  her  by  his  authority,  adorned  her  by  his 
talents,  and  exalted  her  by  his  fame.  His  mission 
was  but  for  ten  years,  and  for  ten  years  only  did 
his  personal  power  mitigate  the  Government ;  but 
though  no  longer  feared  by  the  great,  he  was  not 
forgotten  by  the  wise :  his  influence,  his  writings 
have  survived  a  century,  and  the  foundation  of 
whatever  prosperity  we  have  since  erected  are  laid 
in  the  disinterested  and  magnanimous  patriotism  of 
Swift." 

This  is  not  the  description  of  a  man  who  really 
hated  the  people  amongst  whom  he  dwelt.  His 
hatred  of  and  his  indignation  with  all  mankind  were 
the  outcome  of  his  intense  love,  a  love  so  great  that 
the  folly  of  their  wickedness  and  unreasonableness 
lacerated  his  very  heart  and  soul,  driving  him  to  such 
exasperation  that  both  with  pen  and  tongue  he  strove 


SWIFT   IN    IRELAND  279 

with  bitter  sarcasm   to  awaken  in  them  some  sparks 
of  righteousness  and  reason. 

Swift  had  seen  in  all  the  reforms  on  which  he 
embarked,  the  erroneous  principle  underlying  the 
abuse,  and  on  the  abuse  he  took  his  stand,  in  order  to 
assert  the  principle.  He  always  saw,  with  an  eye 
absolutely  unerring,  the  canker  at  the  root  of  the 
tree,  and  he  refused  to  be  deceived  into  attacking 
withered  leaves  and  blighted  blossoms.  If  the  probe 
sometimes  touched  the  quick,  it  is  perhaps  not  a 
reprehensible  fault.  It  is  less  open  to  comment  than 
pulling  off  withered  buds.  Swift  was  able  to  do  what 
few  people  are  capable  of  doing.  He  applied  his 
religious  principles  to  life  without  one  departure 
from  the  gospel  of  sanity.  Thus  it  comes  about  that 
his  sermon  "On  doing  good"  contains  in  it  an  ideal 
of  patriotism  higher  than  most  ideals  published  in 
text-books  on  that  subject.  It  is  an  essentially  moral 
essay,  somewhat  Baconian  in  its  ethics.  "  Nature 
directs  every  one  of  us,  and  God  permits  us,  to 
consult  our  own  private  good  before  the  private 
good  of  any  other  person  whatsoever.  We  are, 
indeed,  commanded  to  love  our  neighbour  as  our- 
selves; but  not  as  well  as  ourselves.  The  love  we 
have  for  ourselves  is  to  be  the  pattern  of  that  love  we 
ought  to  have  towards  our  neighbour;  but  as  the 
copy  doth  not  equal  the  original,  so  my  neighbour 
cannot  think  it  hard  if  I  prefer  myself,  who  am  the 
original,  before  him  who  is  onl}^  the  copy.  Thus,  if 
any  matter  equally  concern  the  life,  the  reputation, 
the  profit  of  my  neighbour  and  my  own,  the  law  of 


28o  DEAN   SWIFT 

nature,  which  is  the  law  of  God,  obligeth  me  to  take 
care  of  myself  first,  and  afterwards  of  him.  And  this 
I  need  not  be  at  much  pains  in  persuading  you,  for 
the  want  of  self-love  with  regard  to  things  of  this 
world,  is  not  among  the  faults  of  mankind.  But  then, 
on  the  other  side,  if,  by  a  small  hurt  and  loss  to 
myself,  I  can  procure  a  great  good  to  my  neighbour, 
in  that  case,  his  interest  is  to  be  preferred.  For 
example,  if  I  can  be  sure  of  saving  his  life  without 
great  danger  to  my  own  :  if  I  can  preserve  him  from 
being  undone  without  ruining  myself:  or  recover  his 
reputation  without  blasting  mine — all  this  I  am 
obliged  to  do,  and,  if  I  sincerely  perform  it,  I  do  then 
obey  the  command  of  God,  loving  my  neighbour  as 
myself  But,  besides  this  love  we  owe  to  every  man 
in  his  particular  capacity,  under  the  title  of  our 
neighbour,  there  is  3^et  a  duty  of  a  more  large, 
extensive  nature  incumbent  on  us — our  love  to  our 
neighbour  in  his  public  capacity,  as  he  is  a  member 
of  that  great  body,  the  Commonwealth,  under  the 
same  government  with  ourselves,  and  this  is  usually 
called  love  of  the  public,  and  is  a  duty  to  which  we 
are  more  strictly  obliged  than  even  that  of  loving  our- 
selves, because  wherein  ourselves  are  also  contained 
— as  well  as  all  our  neighbours — is  one  great  body. 
The  love  of  the  public,  or  of  the  Commonwealth, 
or  love  of  our  country,  was  in  ancient  time 
properly  known  by  the  name  of  virtue,  because  it 
was  the  greatest  of  all  virtues,  and  was  supposed  to 
contain  all  virtues  in  it;  and  many  great  examples 
of  this  virtue  are  left  us  on  record,  scarcely  to  be 


SWIFT   IN    IRELAND  281 

believed,  or  even  conceived,  in  such  a  bare,  corrupted, 
wicked  age  as  this  we  live  in.  In  those  times  it  was 
common  for  men  to  sacrifice  their  lives  for  the  good 
of  their  country,  although  they  had  neither  hope  nor 
belief  of  future  rewards ;  whereas,  in  our  days,  very 
few  make  the  least  scruple  of  sacrificing  a  whole 
nation,  as  well  as  their  own  souls,  for  a  little  present 
gain — which  often  hath  been  known  to  end  in  their 
own  ruin  in  this  world,  as  it  certainly  must  in  that 
time  to  come.  Have  we  not  seen  men  for  the  sake  of 
some  petty  employment  give  up  the  very  natural 
rights  and  liberties  of  the  country,  and  of  mankind,  in 
the  ruin  of  which  themselves  must  at  last  be  involved  ? 
Are  not  these  corruptions  gotten  among  the  meanest 
of  our  people,  who  for  a  piece  of  money  will  give 
their  votes  at  a  venture  for  the  disposal  of  their  own 
lives  and  fortunes,  without  considering  whether  it 
be  those  who  are  most  likely  to  betray  or  defend 
them  ?  But  if  I  were  to  produce  only  one  instance 
of  a  hundred  where  we  fail  in  the  duty  of  loving  our 
country  it  would  be  an  endless  labour,  and  therefore 
I  shall  not  attempt  it."  He  defines  loyalty  still 
further — 

"  But  here  I  would  not  be  misunderstood.  By  the 
love  of  our  country,  I  do  not  mean  loyalty  to  our 
King,  for  that  is  a  duty  of  another  nature,  and  a  man 
may  be  very  loyal,  in  the  common  sense  of  the  word, 
without  one  grain  of  public  good  in  his  heart. 
Witness  this  very  kingdom  we  live  in.  I  verily 
believe,  that  since  the  beginning  of  the  world,  no 
nation    upon   earth   ever   shewed  (all   circumstances 


282  DEAN   SWIFT 

considered),  such  high  constant  marks  of  loyalty  in  all 
their  action  and  behaviour  as  we  have  done ;  and 
at  the  same  time,  no  people  ever  appeared  more 
utterly  void  of  what  is  called  public  spirit.  When 
I  say  the  people  I  mean  the  bulk  or  mass  of  the 
people,  for  I  have  nothing  to  do  with  those  in  power; 
therefore,  I  shall  think  my  time  not  ill-spent  if  I  can 
persuade  most  and  all  of  you  who  hear  me,  to  shew  the 
love  you  have  for  your  country  by  endeavouring  in 
your  several  situations  to  do  all  the  public  good  you 
can.  For  I  am  certainly  persuaded  that  all  our  mis- 
fortunes arise  from  no  other  original  cause  than  that 
general  disregard  among  us  to  the  public  welfare." 

What  did  loyalty  mean  to  the  Irish?  It  meant 
complete  subjection  of  the  Celtic  temperament  and 
character  to  what  must  in  those  days  have  been 
considered  an  alien  power.  If  a  people  of  this  nature 
once  becomes  servile  and  loses  its  self-respect  all  is 
over  with  it.  Indifference  to  its  own  interests  means 
self-inflicted  death,  suicide  under  the  most  depressing 
circumstances.  The  fall  of  the  Irish  character,  when 
it  once  enters  on  the  down  grade,  is  almost  instan- 
taneous and  terribly  complete.  Such  a  character  is 
capable  of  reaching  the  highest  heights  and  of  sinking 
to  the  lowest  depths.  Swift  fully  realized  the 
necessity  of  raising  the  Irish  self-esteem,  he  could 
see  the  effect  which  had  been  gradually  produced  by 
the  repeated  attacks  of  England  upon  Irish  trade. 
The  one  thing  needful  was  to  give  Ireland  a  high 
standard  to  maintain,  and  this  he  did.  At  the  same 
time  he  won  for  himself  a  place  in  the  affection  of  the 


SWIFT    IN    IRELAND  283 

Irish  people,  such  that  they  looked  on  him  as  the 
saviour  of  their  country  and  the  greatest  benefactor 
of  their  people  ever  known.  None  of  Ireland's  later 
patriots  has  been  so  much  beloved  by  this  people  of 
impulse  and  deep,  strong  affection.  His  untiring 
advocacy  of  their  cause,  his  indignation  at  their 
wrongs,,  his  complete  surrender  of  himself  to  the 
cause  of  the  Irish  won  them  over  to  an  allegiance 
from  which  they  never  once  wavered.  When  once 
he  had  found  a  place  deep  down  in  their  hearts  he 
remained  there  for  ever,  while  their  love  for  him  was 
passed  on  as  a  heritage  to  their  children's  children. 
While  Swift  was  looked  on  in  England  as  the  saviour 
of  a  party,  as  the  defender  of  the  Church,  and  the 
upholder  of  England's  position  abroad :  in  Ireland 
he  was  looked  on  as  the  father  of  his  people,  the 
patron  and  defender  of  each  individual  home,  and  of 
every  Irishman.  Blessings  were  showered  on  him  as 
he  passed  through  the  streets.  All  Ireland  united  to 
defend  him. 

But  his  work  was  over.  With  the  "  Modest  Pro- 
posal "  in  1729  his  political  work  came  to  an  end ;  with 
"Gulliver's  Travels,"  published  in  1727,  his  literary 
work  of  any  importance  came  to  an  end.  In  1728  the 
death  of  Stella  deprived  him  of  every  hope  of  lasting 
happiness,  and  cast  over  his  mind  a  veil  of  gloom 
never  to  be  lifted. 


CHAPTER  VIII 

FINALE 

FOR  the  last  seventeen  years  of  his  life  we  have 
to  consider  Swift  as  the  Dean  of  St.  Patrick's, 
devoid  of  all  those  public  interests  which  so 
far  have  made  his  life.  He  has  become  a  private 
individual.  Many  pessimists  have  drawn  a  picture  of 
these  last  years  as  of  a  period  of  hopeless  bitterness 
and  misery.  In  fact  they  have  surrounded  him  with 
all  the  sordid  accompaniments  of  madness  throughout 
this  time.  In  so  doing  they  have  unthinkingly  passed 
over  a  side  of  Swift's  life  which  in  some  respects  is 
full  of  brightness,  and  presents  him  in  a  very  pleasant 
aspect.  He  was  now  sixty  years  of  age,  and  indeed 
had  entered  on  the  period  of  old  age  of  which  he  had 
always  had  only  the  most  gloomy  anticipations.  The 
hopes  of  greatness  which  in  his  youth  had  buoyed 
him  up,  he  could  only  consider  as  half-fulfilled,  and 
he  knew  that  nothing  more  could  be  his.  Yet  he 
could  rest  in  the  steadfast  affection  of  his  people. 
St.  Patrick's  Deanery  formed  the  centre  of  a  people 
who  loved  him,  and  to  whom  he  was  now  drawn  by 
ties  of  affection.  The  misanthropic  expression  of 
hatred  which  pervades  "Gulliver's  Travels"  did  not 

284 


DEAN    SWIFT 

KKO.M    THE    RUST    IN    ST.    1'ATRICK's    DEANEHV,    DLIU.IX 


FINALE  285 

include  individuals,  but  only  mankind  as  a  whole. 
When  we  consider  Swift's  personal  relationship  with 
his  people  we  must  perforce  look  on  them  as  the 
individuals  to  whom  his  hatred  did  not  extend.  We 
have  a  pleasant  picture  of  Swift  surrounded  at  this 
time  by  the  people  who  worshipped  him.  His  life 
was  rendered  still  more  cheerful  by  a  group  of 
devoted  friends,  among  whom  are  many  interesting 
personages.  Gay  and  Prior  have  been  mentioned  in 
another  connection.  Perhaps,  too,  they  were  not  so 
closely  connected  as  the  rest  of  the  circle  which 
included  Arbuthnot,  Pope,  Dr.  Sheridan,  and  Dr. 
Delany.  Minor  members  were  Mrs.  Delany  and  the 
Pilkingtons,  of  whom  Mrs.  Letitia  Pilkington  has 
become  famous  through  her  memoirs  of  Swift,  un- 
authentic though  many  of  them  are.  More  sub- 
ordinate characters  in  Swift's  last  years  are  Mrs. 
Whiteway,  his  housekeeper,  and  Mrs.  Martha  Blount, 
the  friend  of  Pope. 

The  three  men,  Arbuthnot,  Pope,  and  Dr.  Sheridan, 
form  a  trio,  each  interesting  to  us,  for  his  fascinating 
personality,  and  valuable  for  the  life  of  Swift,  as 
bringing  out  new  sides  to  his  character  and  adding 
new  charms  to  his  individuality.  The  rugged  Dean 
with  the  dignity  lent  by  his  sixty  years,  in  the  middle 
of  the  circle  of  his  intimate  friends,  is  a  picture  over 
which  we  are  inclined  to  linger  pleasantly,  unwilling 
to  hasten  the  years  which  make  for  sadness.  We  are 
able  to  realize  how  venerable  was  his  appearance 
from  the  two  busts  of  him  executed  at  this  time. 
One  stands  in  the  Cathedral,  the  other  in  the  Deanery. 


286  DEAN    SWIFT 

The  latter  is,  perhaps,  the  only  representation  of  Dr. 
Swift  which  expresses  the  divine  rather  than  the 
politician.  The  former  shows  us  a  strong,  virile 
head,  fully  capable  of  all  the  work  which  Swift  had 
accomplished.  The  mouth  and  eyes,  expressing  the 
capability  and  experience  of  the  man  of  the  world, 
would  be  hard,  were  they  not  redeemed  by  strongly 
humorous  lines.  Kindly  humour  is  perhaps  the 
prevailing  expression.  It  is  preeminently  the  repre- 
sentation of  the  Dean  of  St.  Patrick's  in  the  middle  of 
the  people  who  loved  him. 

The  strong  sense  of  humour  was  perhaps  the 
saving  element  in  his  life  at  this  time.  It  enabled 
him  to  respond  to  the  same  characteristic  in  his 
friends.  Many  were  the  jokes  which  these  men 
played  off  on  each  other ;  probably  they  were 
characterized  by  breadth  of  humour  fully  appreciated 
both  by  the  perpetrator  and  the  victim. 

A  fuller  account  of  Swift's  friends  may  very  well 
find  a  place  here. 

Arbuthnot,  one  of  the  leading  physicians  of  the 
day,  is  one  of  the  most  interesting. 

Thackeray's  estimate  of  him  as  "  one  of  the  wisest, 
wittiest,  most  accomplished  of  mankind  "  is  a  true  one. 
He  moved  in  the  circle  of  eighteenth-century  wits, 
surpassed  by  none  in  intellectual  attainments;  greater 
than  the  majority  in  a  sense  of  humour  and  a  power 
of  illustrating  it ;  superior  to  all  in  humanity  and 
gentleness  of  disposition.  His  profession  of  physician 
tended  to  smooth  the  "  corners  "  of  eccentricity.  He 
comes   before    us   as    the    Queen's    physician,   as    a 


^    5 

O    ~ 


FINALE  287 

mathematician  of  no  mean  attainments,  as  a  kindly 
satirist,  and  as  a  friend  of  Swift  and  others,  unfailing 
in  sincerity  of  affection.  There  is  a  peculiar  charm  in 
these  deep  strong  attachments  between  these  men  of 
the  world.  They  form  one  of  the  special  character- 
istics of  the  eighteenth  century.  One  is  tempted  to 
let  the  imagination  wander  to  classical  times  when  we 
find  again  historic  friendships  between  men,  and  we 
are  struck  once  more  by  the  strong  resemblance 
between  the  age  before  us  and  that  of  Maecenas.  The 
writers  of  these  two  periods  seem  to  have  had  time 
to  linger  pleasantly  over  their  work,  to  play  with  forms 
of  literature.  They  loved  to  dally  with  the  Muse  as 
with  a  friend.  They  served  her  as  devotees  at  a  much- 
loved  shrine.  They  had  no  thought  of  selling  her 
into  slavery  in  the  market  of  utility.  She  was  a  deity 
to  be  worshipped,  and  at  the  same  time  a  lovely 
maiden  whom  they  could  salute  as  friend  in  their 
lighter  moments.  She  was  a  lady  whom  all  treated 
more  or  less  confidentially,  as  a  friend  whom  they 
were  glad  to  see  at  all  times  and  on  all  occasions. 
They  had  no  thought  of  treating  her  as  a  rather 
unwelcome  poor  relation,  to  be  entertained  as  a 
matter  of  unpleasant  duty  for  so  many  hours  a  day. 
The  community  of  literary  interests  strengthened  the 
tie  and  bound  these  friends  more  closely  together. 

Arbuthnot  and  Swift  were  well  suited  to  each 
other.  Both  were  endowed  with  an  invaluable  gift  of 
satire,  both  were  possessed  of  a  disinterested  affection 
for  their  fellowmen  great  enough  to  impel  them  to 
express  it  in  action.     Both  found  in   their  work   an 


288  DEAN   SWIFT 

interest  of  sufficient  quality  to  raise  them  above  the 
smallness  of  life.  Perhaps  an  unusual  combination ! 
Both  were  essentially  big  men.  John  Arbuthnot  was 
the  son  of  a  Scottish  clergyman,  a  member  of  an  old 
family  of  strong  Stuart  sympathies  who  had  suffered 
much  for  their  loyalty  at  the  time  of  the  revolution. 
He  studied  medicine  and,  by  a  stroke  of  good  fortune, 
was  appointed  Physician  to  the  Queen  in  1705  in 
return  for  services  rendered  to  Prince  George  of 
Denmark  in  a  sudden  attack  of  illness.  As  Queen's 
physician  he  met  Swift,  and  the  two  men  were  drawn 
closely  together  from  the  beginning  of  their  acquaint- 
ance. Their  first  combined  literary  effort  was  made 
in  the  story  of  the  St.  Alban's  Ghost,  an  attack  on  the 
Duke  and  Duchess  of  Marlborough.  Later  in  1727 
the  pamphlet  "John  Bull  "  appeared.  It  is  not  known 
for  certain  whether  this  was  the  combined  work  of 
Arbuthnot  and  Swift  or  of  Arbuthnot  alone.  It  is  one 
of  the  finest  satires  of  the  period,  humorous,  trenchant, 
yet  kindly.  Arbuthnot  would  have  been  incapable  of 
saying  or  doing  anything  of  an  unkind  nature. 

This  pamphlet,  famous  because  the  name  John 
Bull,  invented  by  Arbuthnot,  has  clung  to  the  British 
character  ever  since,  contained  a  humorous  account 
of  the  negotiations  which  led  up  to  the  Peace  of 
Utrecht,  representing  the  war  of  the  Spanish  Succes- 
sion under  the  form  of  a  lawsuit.  Arbuthnot's  other 
works  comprised  chiefly  political  pamphlets,  best  of 
which  was  that  on  Political  lying,  and  the  "  Memoirs  of 
Martin  Scriblerus,"  to  which  Swift  contributed.  This 
was   the   account   of  the   Scriblerus   Club,  of  which 


FINALE  289 

Arbuthnot  and  Swift  were  the  founders.  It  is  not, 
however,  as  the  writer,  that  Arbuthnot  rouses  our 
interest,  it  is  as  the  doctor  and  friend  of  Swift.  He 
attended  the  Queen  in  her  last  illness  when  Dr.  Rad- 
cliffe  refused  to  commit  himself  to  a  display  of  energy 
sufficient  to  attend  her.  "  Sleep  was  never  more 
welcome  to  a  weary  traveller  than  death  was  to  her," 
said  Arbuthnot  in  his  letter  to  Swift.  His  letters  to 
the  Dean  form  perhaps  the  best  commentary  on  his 
character  and  provide  the  most  interesting  account  of 
his  friendship  with  Swift  and  others,  notably  Pope 
and  Parnell.  He  shared  the  universal  regret  of  the 
Dean's  friends  when  he  was  removed  from  among 
them.  As  Swift's  illness  increased  he  became  afflicted 
with  a  rather  morbid  desire  to  be  forgotten  by  his 
friends,  and  to  be  allowed  to  sink  out  of  their  lives 
and  memories.  In  answer  to  some  expression  of  this 
desire  Arbuthnot  wrote  :  "  I  am  sure  I  never  can  forget 
you  till  I  meet  with  (which  is  impossible)  another, 
whose  conversation  I  can  delight  so  much  in  as  Dr. 
Swift's,  and  yet  that  is  the  smallest  thing  I  ought  to 
value  you  for.  That  hearty,  sincere  friendship,  that 
plain  and  open  ingenuity  in  all  your  converse,  withal 
I  am  sure  I  never  can  find  in  another  man.  I  shall 
want  often  a  faithful  monitor,  one  that  would  vindicate 
me  behind  my  back,  and  tell  me  my  faults  to  my  face. 
God  knows  I  write  this  with  tears  in  my  eyes.  Yet 
do  not  be  obstinate,  but  come  for  a  little  time  to 
London,  and  if  you  must  needs  go,  we  may  waste  a 
manner  of  correspondence  wherever  we  are." 

Arbuthnot   frequently   had    to    play   the   part   of 


290  DEAN   SWIFT 

Barnabas.  December  1 1,  1718,  he  wrote  on  the  subject 
of  Swift's  illness,  "  My  wife  "  (to  whom  he  was  very 
happily  married)  "gives  you  her  kind  love  and  service 
and,  which  is  the  first  thing  that  occurs  to  all  wives, 
wishes  you  were  married." 

In  1723,  about  the  time  of  Vanessa's  death  when  no 
doubt  Swift  fell  that  he  was  held  up  to  scorn  by  many 
who  did  not  understand  the  circumstances,  Arbuthnot 
wrote  :  "  You  don't  seem  to  know  how  very  well  you 
stand  with  our  great  folks.  I  have  myself  been  at  a 
great  man's  table,  and  have  heard  out  the  mouths  of 
violent  Irish  Whigs,  the  whole  table-talk  turn  upon 
your  commendation." 

Arbuthnot's  affection  was  reciprocated  by  Swift, 
who  wrote  to  Pope,  September,  1725,  during 
Arbuthnot's  serious  illness  :  "  If  the  world  had  but  a 
dozen  Arbuthnots  I  would  burn  my  '  Travels.'  I  pray 
God  protect  him,  he  is  as  fit  a  man  either  to  live 
or  die  as  ever  I  knew."  The  following  October 
Arbuthnot  wrote  after  his  recovery :  "  The  hope  of 
seeing  once  more  the  Dean  of  St.  Patrick's  revives 
my  spirits.  I  know  of  nearly  half  a  year's  dinners 
where  you  are  already  bespoke.  I  love  and  long  to 
see  you." 

Some  of  this  correspondence  deals  with  the 
affairs  of  St.  Patrick's.  Arbuthnot  used  evidently 
to  provide  Swift  with  singers  for  his  choir  and  to 
help  him  with  other  things.  We  can  be  quite  sure 
that  no  details  connected  with  the  life  of  one  was 
lacking  in  interest  to  the  other.  Swift,  later,  began 
to   be   a    bad   correspondent,   much    to    Arbuthnot's 


FINALE  291 

anxiety.     Four  years  were  allowed  to  elapse  between 
Swift's  much-looked-for  letters. 

In  1734  Arbuthnot's  health  began  to  fail.  He 
achieved  some  little  literary  work.  We  have  from 
his  pen  a  scientific  essay  "  Concerning  the  effects 
of  the  Air  on  Human  Bodies,"  and  he  collaborated 
with  Pope  in  the  "  Prologue  to  the  Satires."  This 
was  the  end  of  his  literary  work.  He  went  to  live 
at  Hampstead,  knowing  that  his  life  was  drawing 
to  a  close.  He  wrote  to  Swift,  "  I  am  going  out  of 
this  troublous  world,  and  you  among  the  rest  of 
my  friends  shall  have  my  best  prayers  and  good 
wishes."  He  died  the  following  year,  the  first  to 
pass  out  of  the  brilliant  circle.  His  death  came  as 
a  great  shock  to  Swift,  though  for  some  time  he  had 
known  that  his  friend's  life  would  not  be  prolonged. 
The  loss  of  his  friends  by  death  meant  to  Swift  a 
bitter  deprivation.  He  was  far  more  closely  bound 
by  the  ties  of  friendship  than  many  men  of  his  age 
and  position.  Death  meant  to  him  the  most  terrible 
wrench,  and  it  was  his  lot  to  see  nearly  all  his  friends 
removed  from  his  sight,  until  he  felt  that  life  was  no 
longer  worth  living,  and  for  years  before  his  death 
he  wished  to  die. 

Arbuthnot's  position  in  his  century  was  unique. 
He  was  possessed  of  an  inexhaustible  fund  of 
knowledge,  deep  erudition,  an  unlimited  and  fertile 
imagination,  and  an  original  sense  of  humour.  Lord 
Chesterfield  says  that  to  "  his  infinite  fund  of  humour 
Swift  and  Pope  were  more  obliged  than  they  have 
acknowledged."    His  gifts  were  at  the  service  of  all 


292  DEAN   SWIFT 

his  friends.  He  gave  lavishly  without  stinting, 
without  thought  of  fame  for  himself.  Yet  all  his 
friends  knew  him  to  be  their  equal  in  intellectual 
attainments  and  literary  genius  ;  and  would  have 
confessed  it.  "  In  politics  he  was  a  Jacobite  by 
prejudice,  and  a  Republican  by  reflection  and  reason- 
ing." "  He  ate  to  excess,"  says  Lord  Chesterfield. 
"  He  put  no  price  upon  himself  and  was  considered  by 
those  who  knew  him  to  be  infinitely  below  his  level, 
for  the  world  is  complaisant  or  dupe  enough  to  give 
any  man  the  price  he  sets  upon  himself  provided  it 
be  not  insolently  and  overbearingly  demanded.  It 
turns  upon  the  manner  of  asking."  Dr.  Johnson 
considered  him  the  most  universal  genius  of  the 
time.  Perhaps  his  character  possesses  more  charm 
than  the  rest  of  those  of  his  century.  If  we  are 
inclined  to  generalize  on  the  materialism  and  lack 
of  imagination  in  the  eighteenth  century,  we  must 
add  a  saving  clause  when  we  think  of  Arbuthnot. 

With  different  feelings,  perhaps,  we  turn  to  Pope, 
who,  though  he  formed  one  of  Swift's  circle,  was 
so  much  younger  than  the  rest,  that  perhaps  he 
cannot  be  considered  so  closely  identified  with  them. 
At  the  time  when  Swift  was  at  the  height  of  his 
glory.  Pope  was  a  young  poet  looking  to  him  for 
patronage.  Swift  was  one  of  the  first,  perhaps,  to 
recognize  his  capacity.  He  at  any  rate  insisted  on 
his  friends  subscribing  to  the  works  of  the  young 
man,  who,  he  said,  was  "the  first  poet  in  the 
kingdom."  Doubtless  Swift's  estimate  was  exagge- 
rated, though,  if  we  consider  this  half  of  the  century. 


FINALE  293 

we  are  confronted  by  a  grey  dearth  in  poetry,  as 
judged  by  our  own  standard.  It  has  no  doubt 
occurred  to  some  thinkers  that  poetry  is,  after  all,  a 
comparative  quantity,  regulated  to  a  great  extent 
by  convention  and  fashion,  and  that  we,  of  a  later 
century,  have  no  right  to  criticize  harshly  the 
standard  of  an  earlier  one.  To  Pope  belongs  the 
distinction  in  his  circle,  of  being  the  sole  producer 
of  unkind  satire.  The  sledge-hammer  blows  of  Swift 
in  "  Gulliver's  Travels,"  the  delicate  raillery  of  Arbuth- 
not,  the  rough  yet  kindly  jeers  of  Sheridan  at  his 
fellows,  did  not  pass  the  bounds  of  humanity.  But 
in  Pope's  works  we  have  a  feline  malice,  a  despicable 
egoism,  which  is  only  too  likely  to  call  forth  a  like 
spirit  in  his  readers.  Probably  much  can  be  put 
down  to  constitutional  delicacy,  to  a  feeling  of  inferi- 
ority, resulting  from  humility  of  station.  His  defects 
must  be  condoned  because  he  was  received  on  terms 
of  equality  in  the  Swift  circle.  We  know,  too,  that 
he  was  treated  with  a  good  deal  of  affection  by  Swift 
and  Arbuthnot,  and  probably  he  reciprocated  it  to 
the  best  of  his  ability.  His  distorted  view  of  life 
and  human  nature  prevented  him  from  recognizing  the 
good  even  in  his  friends,  so  that  he  could,  after 
their  death,  alter  their  letters  for  publication  to 
bring  his  own  work  and  character  into  a  pleasanter 
light.  Thus  it  is  that  his  testimony  to  Swift  is  some- 
what valueless,  though  he  speaks  of  him  in  terms  of 
appreciation  and  deep  affection.  It  is  perhaps  unfair 
to  introduce  a  character  by  denunciation.  So  much 
has    been    written    of    Pope,    however,    that    it    is 


294  DEAN   SWIFT 

unnecessary  to  do  more  here  than  touch  upon  his  life 
and  work.  He  passed  through  a  lonely  childhood 
owing  to  ill-health.  An  early  precocity,  in  which 
he  was  unfortunately  encouraged,  resulted  in  the- 
production  of  various  attempts  at  translation  and 
verse-writing.  His  productions  of  any  value  date 
from  "  The  Rape  of  the  Lock,"  in  which  there  is 
genius.  "Windsor  Forest"  does  not  appeal  to  our 
ideals  of  nature-worship,  but  it  contains  many 
elements  much  to  be  admired,  a  finished  style,  and 
correctness  of  rhythm  and  metre.  His  great  trans- 
lations were  those  of  the  Iliad  and  Odyssey,  by 
which  he  achieved  his  reputation.  It  is,  however, 
as  a  satirist  that  he  is  of  importance,  and  here 
the  defects  in  his  character  have  raised  him  to  the 
position  which  he  holds  among  English  Satirists. 
A  power  of  delicately  inserting  a  psychological 
probe,  and  as  delicately  describing  the  results  of 
scientific  investigations,  forms  Pope's  chief  claim  to 
greatness.  In  his  "  Epistles  and  Satires"  we  have  his 
finest  work.  In  the  "Dunciad"  we  have  a  magnifi- 
cent memorial  to  Pope's  genius,  and  many  crumbling 
gravestones  surmounting  the  genius  of  others. 

His  relations  with  his  family  were  admirable. 
He  showed  himself  capable  of  the  strongest  aff'ection. 
His  tenderness  to  his  mother  after  his  father's  death, 
is  that  of  the  man  whose  feminine  qualities  help  him 
to  understand  those  of  his  women  friends,  and  he 
nursed  her  in  her  declining  years  with  the  most 
assiduous  gentleness.  He  also  showed  himself 
capable  of  great  affection  in  his  relations  with  the 


FINALE  295 

Blounts.  He  was  a  man  of  strong  affection  and 
strong  dislikes.  When  his  friends  were  in  favour 
with  him  his  admiration  for  their  work  was 
unstinted.  When  they  had  the  misfortune  to  incur 
his  resentment,  he  would  set  no  bounds  to  his 
desire  to  injure  them. 

With  Dr.  Sheridan  rests  the  distinction  of  sharing 
Swift's  last  years  in  Ireland.  Though  Swift  had 
known  many  men,  and  had  been  on  intimate  terms 
with  members  of  every  class  and  kind  of  society, 
it  is  only  when  with  Dr.  Sheridan  that  we  see 
him  really  relax.  When  with  him  he  was  not 
ashamed  to  display  emotion.  Sheridan  knew  him 
in  every  sort  of  humour,  had  encountered  him  in 
every  kind  of  mood.  Their  friendship  dated  from 
Swift's  entry  on  his  Deanery,  and  it  lasted  until  a 
year  or  two  before  the  close  of  Swift's  life.  Their 
intimacy  came  to  an  end  before  Swift's  death  owing 
to  an  unfortunate  outburst  on  the  part  of  Swift,  who 
during  one  of  his  attacks  of  morbidness  towards  the 
close  of  his  life,  misunderstood  some  action  of 
Sheridan's.  This  forms,  perhaps,  one  of  the  saddest 
episodes  of  Swift's  last  years,  because  it  meant 
voluntary  separation  from  almost  the  last  of  his  men 
friends,  and  reduced  his  circle  to  the  doctor  who 
looked  after  him  after  Arbuthnot's  death,  and  the 
two  women  who  ministered  to  his  wants. 

To  Dr.  Sheridan,  moreover,  we  are  indebted  for 
the  stories  and  authentic  anecdotes  which  form  the 
basis  of  the  life  of  Swift  written  by  his  son  Thomas 
Sheridan.  We  can  be  quite  sure  that  none  of  these 


296  DEAN   SWIFT 

are  without  that  kindly  interpretation  of  his  friend's 
actions  which  the  doctor  always  put  upon  them. 

Dr.  Sheridan  was  a  schoolmaster  by  profession, 
famous  in  the  educational  world.  When  Swift 
became  acquainted  with  him  he  was  master  of  a  small 
school  near  Dublin.  Swift,  seeing  that  in  this  sphere 
of  life  Dr.  Sheridan  was  something  of  a  genius, 
did  all  he  could  to  help  him  in  his  profession.  The 
numbers  of  the  school  increased  enormously,  partly 
because  of  Swift's  connection  with  it,  for  his  name 
in  Ireland  was  now  sufficient  to  bring  into  favour 
any  institution  with  which  he  was  connected.  He 
always  advertised  the  school  as  much  as  possible, 
emphasized  his  own  connection  with  it,  acted  as 
examiner  at  the  end  of  the  year,  and  was  indefatig- 
able on  his  friend's  behalf 

The  story  of  his  first  acquaintance  with  the  doctor 
is  related  by  Sheridan's  son.  "  His "  (Sheridan's) 
"acquaintance  with  the  Dean  commenced  soon  after 
his  settlement  in  Ireland  in  the  following  manner. 
The  Dean,  who  had  heard  much  of  Sheridan  as  a 
man  of  wit  and  humour,  desired  a  common  friend 
to  bring  them  together.  They  passed  the  day  much 
to  their  mutual  satisfaction,  and  when  the  company 
broke  up  at  night,  Swift,  in  his  usual  ironical  way, 
said,  *I  invite  all  here  present  to  dine  with  me  next 
Thursday  except  Dr.  Sheridan,'  but  with  a  look 
which  expressed  that  the  invitation  was  made  wholly 
on  his  account."  "  There  are  certain  spirits,"  con- 
tinues Thomas  Sheridan,  quaintly,  ^'  Concordes  aiiimae, 
that  on  the  first  interview  feel  an  irresistible  attraction 


FINALE  297 

to  each  other,  and  rush  into  friendship,  as  some  do 
into  love,  at  first  sight,  and  such  was  the  case 
between  these  two  men  of  genius,  who  had  a  great 
familiarity  both  of  disposition  and  talents  ;  and  who 
in  a  short  time  became  inseparable.  This  union  was 
forwarded,  and  afterwards  cemented,  by  Stella,  who 
gave  the  Doctor  the  preference  to  all  the  Dean's 
other  friends." 

Swift,  moreover,  was  very  much  dependent  upon 
Sheridan's  kind  office  for  society  on  his  first  arrival 
in  Dublin.  He  knew  those  in  high  places,  the 
Archbishop  of  Dublin,  Lord  Chancellor  Phipps,  and 
Bishop  Sterne.  But  he  wished  for  a  circle  of  friends 
among  whom  he  could  unbend  and  be  quite  at  his 
ease.  Dr.  Sheridan,  as  the  first  schoolmaster  in 
Ireland,  was  well  acquainted  with  the  University  set 
in  Dublin,  and  soon  introduced  Swift  among  them,  so 
that  once  more  he  found  himself  in  the  midst  of  con- 
genial spirits,  whose  wit  was  characterized  by  the  same 
spontaneity  as  his  own.  Thomas  Sheridan  tells  us 
that  his  father  was  looked  upon  to  be  one  of  the  most 
agreeable  companions  in  the  world,  "  his  society  was 
much  courted  by  all  persons  of  taste.  With  a  select 
set  of  these  did  Swift  pass  most  of  his  festive  hours 
for  many  years,  but  in  the  round  of  entertainments 
care  was  always  taken  to  engage  Sheridan  before 
a  party  was  fixed,  as  the  Dean  was  never  known  to 
be  in  perfect  good  humour,  but  when  he  was  one  of 
the  company."  Thomas  Sheridan  adds  an  amusing 
little  touch,  that  as  the  society  consisted  of  the  chosen 
set    in   the  college,   and   subjects  of  literature  were 


298  DEAN   SWIFT 

frequently  the  subject  of  conversation,  Swift  some- 
times found  himself  at  a  loss  when  points  of  learning 
came  under  discussion.  He  did  not  wish  to  be 
considered  inferior  to  the  others,  so  he  found  him- 
self compelled  to  revive  his  knowledge  of  Latin  and 
Greek,  which  in  the  hurry  of  politics  and  bustle  of 
the  world,  he  had  so  long  neglected.  With  a  view  to 
continuing  his  education  he  had  an  apartment  fitted 
up  for  the  Doctor  at  the  Deanery,  and  used  to  invite 
him  to  spend  his  vacation  with  him,  so  that  he  might 
go  through  a  complete  course  of  Greek  and  Roman 
classics.  This  served  to  increase  his  already  pro- 
found admiration  for  the  Doctor's  scholarship,  and 
he  pronounced  him  to  be  "the  best  scholar  in 
Europe." 

In  this  way  the  two  men  lived  together  in  the 
closest  intimacy  for  parts  of  many  years  of  their 
lives.  Sheridan  was  of  a  transparent  nature,  genial 
and  affectionate,  and  so  it  did  not  take  Swift  long  to 
know  him  thoroughly.  Swift,  who  was  of  a  much 
more  complex  type,  was  quite  content  that  he  should 
remain  a  little  shrouded  in  mystery,  for  the  Doctor 
was  of  too  simple  and  generous  a  nature  ever  to 
attempt  to  pry  into  the  affairs  of  a  friend  which  did 
not  concern  him.  Sheridan  was  absolutely  truthful 
and  incapable  of  dissimulation.  His  son  says  of  him  : 
"Of  a  proud  independent  spirit,  which  would  not 
suffer  him  to  crawl  to  the  great  ones  of  the  world 
for  any  favour,  nor  to  put  on  even  the  appearance 
of  flattery.  He  had  a  heart  formed  for  friendship, 
in  which  Swift  had  the  first  place.     It  was  impossible 


FINALE  299 

not  to  esteem  a  man  possessed  of  qualities  so  con- 
genial with  his  own :  but  his  affection  was  engaged 
by  those  of  a  less  exalted  kind,  and  more  pleasing  in 
the  general  intercourse  of  life." 

Perhaps  Sheridan's  chief  claim  to  favour  with 
Swift  rested  in  his  perpetual  flow  of  spirits.  None 
of  his  misfortunes,  which,  alas  !  were  many  in  number, 
could  restrain  Sheridan  when  he  had  once  embarked 
on  the  sea  of  nonsense.  It  was  impossible  for  the 
most  gloomy  to  remain  morose  in  his  company. 
He  was  absolutely  indispensable  to  Swift,  from  the 
beginning  of  their  friendship,  and  as  Swift's  gloom 
began  to  increase  after  Stella's  death,  Sheridan  was 
the  only  friend  who  could  lighten  his  hours  of 
depression.  He  gradually  gave  up  interest  in  public 
affairs,  he  was  not  capable  of  any  great  mental  strain, 
because  old  age  was  beginning  to  tell  on  his  faculties, 
and  he  therefore  gave  himself  up  to  literary  trifling, 
bagatelle  and  jeu  d esprit.  No  one  was  better  able  to 
join  Swift  in  this  form  of  amusement  than  Sheridan, 
and  for  a  whole  year  it  was  agreed  that  they  should 
write  to  each  other  in  verse  every  day,  binding 
themselves  not  to  take  more  than  five  minutes  in 
composing  each  letter.  In  this  way  they  produced 
numbers  of  riddles  in  Anglo-Latin,  letters  and  verses. 
Most  of  these  effusions,  however,  were  burnt,  but  a 
few,  including  the  play  upon  the  termination  -ling, 
have  been  handed  down  with  the  rest  of  Swift's 
works. 

Sheridan,  however,  met  at  times  with  a  good  deal 
of  reproach  from  Swift.     He  was  generous  to  a  fault. 


300  DEAN   SWIFT 

and  quite  unskilled  in  knowledge  of  the  world,  so 
that  the  more  practical  Swift  felt  that  it  was  incum- 
bent on  him  to  administer  reproof.  The  Doctor 
was  hopelessly  extravagant,  and  continually  allowed 
impulse  to  carry  him  away.  He  was  also  extremely 
obstinate,  and  often  refused  to  listen  to  the  Dean's 
reproaches.  Swift  had  by  this  time  won  an  unjustifi- 
able reputation  for  avarice,  and  probably  the  Doctor 
thought  that  his  friend's  reproaches  arose  merely  out 
of  this  fault. 

Swift  found  that  his  only  way  of  helping  him 
was  to  increase  the  prosperity  of  his  school,  and  this 
he  did  by  extending  its  reputation  as  far  as  pos- 
sible. He  soon  saw,  however,  that  Sheridan's 
expenditure  far  surpassed  his  income,  and  therefore 
obtained  for  him  the  school  of  Armagh.  Sheridan 
refused  to  go  without  consulting  certain  people 
whom  he  called  his  friends.  This  enraged  Swift  very 
much  and  he  read  him  a  lecture.  "  Your  friends  ! " 
he  said ;  "  you  will  ever  be  a  blockhead  as  to  the 
world.  Because  they  are  pleased  with  your  company, 
and  gratify  themselves  in  passing  many  hours  with 
you  in  social  mirth,  you  suppose  them  to  be  your 
friends.  Believe  me  there  is  little  true  friendship  in 
the  world,  and  it  is  not  impossible  but  the  very  men 
who  now  hug  you  to  their  bosoms,  may  hereafter 
turn  out  to  be  your  inveterate  enemies.  Take  my 
advice,  consult  none  of  them ;  bnt  accept  without 
hesitation  of  an  offer  which  will  secure  you  a  handsome 
income  for  life,  independent  of  casualties.  Besides, 
your  school  will  probably  flourish  as  much  there  as 


FINALE  301 

here,  as  the  high  reputation  you  have  gained  in 
Dublin  will  follow  you  to  the  North,  and  secure  to 
you  all  the  boys  of  that  most  populous  and  opulent 
part  of  the  kingdom." 

The  unfortunate  Doctor,  however,  declined  the 
offer,  in  deference  to  the  wishes  of  his  friends,  and 
was  bitterly  disappointed  to  find  that  Swift's  worst 
predictions  were  verified,  and  by  degrees  his  quondam 
friends  fell  away,  after  treating  him  in  a  most  under- 
hand manner  by  setting  up  a  rival  school.  Swift  was 
no  doubt  glad  to  keep  the  Doctor  so  near  himself, 
for  he  depended  upon  him  almost  entirely  for  society 
in  his  later  years.  He  made  a  further  effort  to  help 
Sheridan  in  obtaining  for  him  the  post  of  domestic 
chaplain  to  Lord  Carteret  on  his  appointment  to  the 
Government  of  Ireland.  This  led  a  little  later  to  the 
gift  of  a  living,  which  Sheridan  immediately  lost 
through  an  unfortunate  attack  of  absent-mindedness. 
The  story  is  worth  quoting  in  Thomas  Sheridan's 
words  :  "  When  he "  (Sheridan)  "  went  down  to  be 
inducted  into  his  living,  he  was  requested  by  Arch- 
deacon Russel  of  Cork,  to  supply  his  place  in  the 
pulpit  the  following  Sunday.  The  Doctor,  who  was  a 
very  absent  man,  had  forgot  his  engagement,  and  was 
sitting  quietly  at  his  lodgings  en  deshabille,  when  a 
message  from  the  Parish  Clerk,  who  saw  no  preacher 
arrive  after  the  service  had  begun,  roused  him  from 
his  reverie.  He  dressed  himself  with  all  speed,  and 
of  two  sermons  that  he  had  brought  with  him,  took 
the  first  that  came  to  his  hand,  without  looking 
into  it.     It  happened  that  the  first  of  August  in  that 


302  DEAN   SWIFT 

year  fell  on  that  very  Sunday,  and  the  first  of  August, 
being  the  day  on  which  Queen  Anne  died,  was,  in 
that  time  of  party,  a  day  of  great  celebrity,  and  much 
adverted  to  by  the  Whigs.  But  this  circumstance  had 
not  at  all  occurred  to  the  Doctor,  who  looked  on  it  as 
a  common  Sunday,  without  considering  the  day  of 
the  month.  The  text  of  this  sermon  happened  to  be 
"  Sufficient  unto  the  day  is  the  evil  thereof"  Such  a 
text  on  such  a  day  excited  a  general  murmur  through- 
out the  whole  congregation,  to  the  great  surprise  of 
the  preacher,  who  was  the  only  person  ignorant  of 
the  cause,  of  which  he  was  not  informed  till  after  he 
had  descended  from  the  pulpit,  when  the  affair  was 
past  remedy.  There  happened  to  be  present  in  the 
Church  a  furious  Whig,  and  one  of  the  most  violent 
party-men  of  the  times.  He  immediately  took  post 
for  Dublin,  where,  by  his  representation  of  this 
matter,  as  Swift  has  observed  in  giving  an  account 
of  this  transaction,  'Such  a  clamour  was  raised  by 
the  zeal  of  one  man,  of  no  large  dimensions  either  of 
body  or  mind,  that  we  in  Dublin  could  apprehend  no 
less  than  an  invasion  by  the  Pretender,  who  must  be 
landed  in  the  South.'  Such  indeed  was  the  violent 
clamour  raised  by  the  Whigs  in  general,  that  the 
Lord-Lieutenant,  in  order  to  pacify  them,  was 
obliged  to  order  the  Doctor's  name  to  be  struck  out 
of  the  list  of  chaplains,  and  to  forbid  his  appearance 
at  the  Castle,  though  he  was  perfectly  satisfied  of 
his  innocence,  as  it  appeared  that  in  the  whole 
sermon  there  was  not  a  syllable  relating  to  Govern- 
ment  or  part}^,  or   to    the   subject  of  the  day,  and 


FINALE  303 

that  he  had  often  preached  it  before  under  the  same 
text." 

Swift  saw,  to  his  chagrin,  that  all  his  efforts  to 
help  his  friend  were  useless.  When  a  little  later  Dr. 
Sheridan  was  presented  by  Archdeacon  Russel  with 
a  valuable  manor  to  enable  him  to  support  his  family, 
it  was  of  no  real  benefit  to  him  because,  as  soon  as 
his  income  increased,  his  expenditure  increased  by 
double  the  amount.  He  was  devoted  to  his  children, 
and  insisted  on  providing  them  with  every  possible 
luxury.  Besides  this,  he  received  many  pupils  without 
payment,  and  even  fed  and  clothed  them  at  his  own 
expense.  Not  even  the  most  lucrative  income  could 
stand  a  strain  of  this  sort,  and  the  Doctor  was  com- 
pelled to  retract,  now  in  one  way,  now  in  another, 
until  finally  he  exchanged  his  living  for  the  free- 
school  of  Cavan,  though  to  another  diminution  of  his 
income. 

Swift  happened  to  visit  him  while  he  was  prepar- 
ing to  remove  to  Cavan.  He  entered  the  house  just 
as  the  workmen  were  taking  down  the  pictures,  and 
was  so  overcome  by  the  sight  that  he  burst  into 
tears.  It  did  not  take  him  long  to  follow  his  friend, 
and  he  made  arrangements  to  pass  the  winter  with 
him.  Swift  had  now  reached  the  age  of  seventy. 
Thomas  Sheridan  thus  describes  him  at  this  time : 
"  His  person  was  quite  emaciated,  and  bore  the  marks 
of  many  more  years  than  had  passed  over  his  head. 
His  memory  greatly  impaired,  and  his  other  faculties 
much  on  the  decline.  His  temper  peevish,  fretful, 
morose  and  prone  to  sudden  fits  of  passion  :  and  yet 


304  DEAN    SWIFT 

to  me  his  behaviour  was  gentle,  as  it  always  had  been 
from  my  early  childhood,  treating  me  with  partial 
kindness  and  attention  as  being  his  godson." 

He  had  now  developed  an  almost  morbid  affection 
for  Sheridan.  Old  age  had  made  rapid  strides,  and  with 
it  had  come  the  morbid  passion  for  economy  resulting 
in  the  most  uncontrolled  avarice,  so  that  he  could  not 
bear  to  spend  anything  on  his  friend,  and  yet  he  must 
have  him  with  him.  Unfortunately  for  his  own  peace 
of  mind  he  was  fully  conscious  of  this  growing 
infirmity,  and  asked  the  Doctor  to  tell  him  of  every 
occasion  on  which  he  found  him  guilty  of  giving  way 
to  the  fault  of  avarice.  The  result  of  the  Doctor's 
candour  was  almost  fatal  to  their  friendship,  which  in 
fact  came  to  an  end  a  few  months  later.  Dr.  Sheridan 
had  been  compelled  to  seek  his  usual  shelter  at  the 
Deanery  during  a  move  from  Cavan  to  Dublin. 
While  there,  he  was  seized  with  a  sudden  attack  of 
illness,  which  confined  him  to  his  room  for  some 
time. 

He  apologized  to  the  Dean  for  his  extensive  visit, 
and  Mrs.  Whiteway,  the  housekeeper,  a  relation  of 
the  Dean,  said  to  him,  "  It  is  in  your  power,  Doctor,  to 
remedy  this  by  removing  to  another  lodging."  The 
Dean,  to  his  friend's  surprise,  made  no  comment,  and 
Dr.  Sheridan  left  the  house,  never  to  return  to  it 
again.  He  only  lived  a  short  time  after  this  without 
seeing  Swift  again. 

The  account  of  Swift's  parting  with  his  friend, 
which  contains  so  many  distressing  elements,  points 
to  the  fact  that  the  last  scene  in  his  life  has  begun. 


FINALE  305 

It  is  a  dark  gloomy  chapter  on  which  we  have 
entered,  without  perhaps  one  gleam  of  light.  We 
now  have  to  look  at  the  progress  of  that  decay, 
saddest  of  all,  of  a  great  human  personality.  It  is 
unnecessary  to  state  here  that  Swift  never  became 
insane,  even  during  those  last  three  years  when  he 
was  under  medical  supervision.  He  had  all  his  life 
suffered  from  a  painful  disease,  labyrinthine  vertigo, 
and  it  has  now  been  fully  established  on  medical 
authority  that  the  aphasia  from  which  he  suffered  in 
those  last  years  was  caused  purely  by  senile  decay. 
The  course  of  this  disease  is  best  described  in  Swift's 
own  words,  given  chiefly  in  letters  written  at  various 
times.  It  is  best  to  take  it  more  or  less  in  the  form 
of  a  diary  giving  a  chronological  account  of  the 
disease. 

Swift,  writing  to  Mrs.  Howard,  1727,  thus  describes 
the  beginning  of  his  complaint:  "About  two  hours 
before  you  were  born  "  {i.e.  1690)  "  I  got  my  giddiness 
by  eating  a  hundred  golden  pippins  at  a  time  at 
Richmond ;  and  when  you  were  four  years  and  a 
quarter  old,  bating  two  days,  having  made  a  fine  seat 
about  twenty  miles  farther  in  Surrey,  where  I  used  to 
read — and  there  I  got  my  deafness  :  and  these  two 
friends  have  visited  me,  one  or  other,  every  year 
since;  and  being  old  acquaintances,  have  now  thought 
fit  to  come  together." 

Lord  Orrery  says  that  "in  compliance  with  the 
advice  of  his  physician,  when  he  was  sufficiently 
recovered  to  travel,  he  went  into  Ireland  to  try  the 
eff'ects  of  his  native  air :  and  he  found  so  much  benefit 


3o6  DEAN   SWIFT 

by  the  journey,  that  in  compliance  to  his  own  inclina- 
tion he  soon  returned  to  England." 

In  early  life  he  was  of  remarkably  active  habits, 
and  always  exceedingly  sober  and  temperate.  From 
the  date  of  his  first  attack  he  seems  to  have  had  a 
presentiment  of  a  fatal  termination,  and  the  dread  of 
some  head  affection  (as  may  be  gleaned  from  in- 
numerable passages  in  his  writings)  seems  to  have 
haunted  him  afterwards,  producing  those  fits  of 
melancholy  and  despondency  to  which  it  is  well 
known  he  was  subject. 

During  his  first  residence  at  Sheen  and  Moor 
Park,  prior  to  1694,  Scott  says  his  studies  were 
partially  interrupted  by  bad  health.  There  is,  how- 
ever, no  authority  for  this  statement  except  a  letter 
to  Mrs.  Howard. 

There  is  no  complaint  during  his  life  at  Laracor 
with  Stella  and  Mrs.  Dingley,  though  he  was  subject 
to  return  of  his  malady  when  much  in  society — in 
London  or  Dublin. 

In  1708  he  writes  to  Archbishop  King  of  Dublin: 
"  I  have  been  confined  near  two  months  this  winter, 
and  forbid  pen  and  ink  by  my  physician,  though, 
thank  God!  I  was  more  frightened  than  hurt.  I 
had  a  colic  about  the  year  1696  that  brought  me  to 
extremity,  and  all  despaired  of  my  life  and  the  news- 
letters reported  me  dead.  It  began  at  the  same  time 
of  the  year,  and  the  same  way  it  did  then,  and  the 
winters  were  much  alike,  and  I  verily  believe,  had 
I  not  had  the  assistance  of  my  old  physician.  Sir 
Patrick   Dean,  I  should  have   run   the  same  course, 


FINALE  307 

which  I  could  not  have  supported,  but  with  a  little 
physic,  and  the  Spa  and  Bath  waters,  I  escaped 
without  other  hardships  than  keeping  at  home." 

In  another  letter  he  writes :  "  I  was  then  for  a 
long  time  pursued  by  a  cruel  illness  that  seized 
me  at  fits,  and  hindered  me  from  meddling  in  any 
business." 

1710-1713. — "In  London."   Vide  "Journal  to  Stella." 

Oct.  27///.—"  Head  pretty  well." 

Oct  list. — "  Fit  of  giddiness — oil  for  ear  required." 

Nov.  \st. — "  No  giddiness — drank  brandy.  Sat  up 
the  night  before  my  giddiness  pretty  late,  and  drank 
very  much,  so  I  will  impute  it  to  that ;  but  I  never  eat 
fruit  nor  drink  ale." 

Nov.  16th. — "  I  have  no  fit  since  the  first.  Other 
casual  illnesses." 

Dec.  isf.—'*  No  fit  since  my  first :  although  some- 
times head  is  not  quite  in  good  order." 

Dec.  gth.—"  I  never  was  giddy  since  my  first  fit, 
but  I  have  had  a  cold,  etc." 

171 1.  Jan.  iT,th.—''  Ugly  giddy  fit." 

[During  the  last  few  days  of  January  he  had  a 
return  of  his  symptoms.]  "  My  head  is  not  in  order, 
and  yet  it  is  not  absolutely  ill,  but  giddyish  and  makes 
me  listless.  I  walk  every  day  and  take  drops  of  Dr. 
Cockburn,  and  have  just  done  a  box  of  pills,  and 
to-day  Lady  Derry  sent  me  some  of  her  bitter  drink, 
which  I  desire  to  take  twice  a  day,  and  hope  I  shall 
grow  better.  My  riding  in  Ireland  keeps  me  well. 
I  am  very  temperate  and  eat  of  the  easiest  meals,  as 


308  DEAN   SWIFT 

I  am  directed,  and  hope  this  malignity  will  go  off: 
but  one  fit  shakes  me  a  long  time." 

Feb.  \st. — "  I  was  this  morning  with  poor  Lady 
Derry,  who  is  much  worse  in  her  head  than  I.  She 
sends  me  bottles  of  her  bitter,  and  we  are  so  fond 
of  one  another  because  our  ailments  are  the  same." 

Feb.  4th. — "  I  avoid  going  to  Church  yet,  for  fear 
of  my  head,  though  it  has  been  much  better  these 
last  five  or  six  days  since  I  have  taken  Lady  Berry's 
bitters." 

Feb.  \ith. — "I  have  no  fits  of  giddiness,  but  only 
some  little  disorders  towards  it,  and  I  walk  as  much 
as  I  can."  [Active  exercise,  particularly  walking, 
was  of  great  service  to  him  throughout  his  illness, 
also  rest,  quiet  and  avoidance  of  all  excitement,  as 
well  as  great  abstinence  in  his  regimen. 

Several  attacks  may  be  traced  to  undue  activity  in 
politics  and  literature,  while  he  ascribes  several  fits  of 
giddiness  to  excess  in  eating  and  drinking.] 

Feb.  lyth. — "  My  head  has  no  fits,  but  is  a  little 
disordered  before  dinner :  yet  I  walk  stoutly  and  take 
pills  and  hope  to  mend."  [It  is,  therefore,  evident  that 
unsteadiness  of  gait  was  a  constant  and  well-marked 
symptom  of  his  disease.] 

"No  fits,  but  a  little  disorder  every  day,  which  I 
can  easily  bear,  if  it  will  not  grow  worse." 

[Probably  this  use  of  the  word  "fit"  led  biographers 
to  believe  that  he  was  subject  to  epilepsy.] 

Apr.  gth. — "  My  head  is  pretty  tolerable,  but  every 
day  I  get  some  little  disorder.  I  have  left  off  snuff 
since  Sunday,  finding  myself  much  worse  after  taking 


FINALE  309 

a  good  deal  of  the  Secretary's.  I  would  not  let  him 
drink  one  drop  of  Champagne  or  Burgundy  without 
water,  and  in  compliment  I  did  the  same  myself." 
[Harley  then  recovering  from  wound  given  him  by 
Guiscard.] 

16///. — "Drank  Tokay;"  [the  effect  of  which  he 
felt  that  night  and  all  next  day,  yet  it  did  not  prevent 
his  accepting  invitations.] 

iSih. — [Grew  worse — made  some  slight  mistake 
in  dating  his  journal,  apparently  the  first  symptom 
of  that  loss  of  memory  of  which  he  speaks  so 
feelingly  twenty-five  years  after.]  "  I  dined  with 
Lord  Anglesea  to-day,  but  did  not  go  to  the  House  of 
Commons  .  .  .  my  head  was  not  well  enough.  I 
know  not  what  is  the  matter :  it  has  never  been  thus 
before :  two  days  together  giddy  from  morning  till 
night,  but  not  with  any  violence  or  pain ;  and  I  totter 
a  little  but  can  make  shift  to  walk :  I  doubt  I  must 
fall  to  my  pills  again,  I  think  of  going  into  the  country 
a  little  way." 

Apr.  2isL — "My  head,  I  thank  God,  is  better,  but 
to  be  giddyish  three  or  four  days  together  mortified 
me.  /  take  no  snuff,  and  will  be  very  regular  in  eating 
little  and  the  gentlest  meats.  Well,  we  dined  to-day 
according  to  appointment.  Lord  Keeper  went  away 
at  near  eight,  I  at  eight,  and  I  believe  the  rest  will  be 
fairly  fuddled.  .  .  .  /  drank  little,  miss  iny  glass  often, 
put  water  in  my  wine,  and  go  away  before  the  rest,  zvhich 
I  take  to  be  a  good  receipt  for  sobriety"  [Deafness  did 
not  up,  to  this  period,  form  a  symptom.] 

Apr.  28th. — "  My  ears  have  been,  these  three  months 


310  DEAN   SWIFT 

past,  much  better  than  any  time  these  two  years  :  but 
now  they  begin  to  be  a  little  out  of  order  again.  My 
head  is  better,  though  not  right :  but  I  trust  to  air 
and  walking." 

[He  then  took  long  walks  every  day,  and  by  the 
advice  of  Dr.  Radcliffe,  left  off  Bohea  tea,  which  he 
had  observed  to  disagree  with  him  frequently  before. 

Dr.  Cockburn  was  his  general  attendant] 

May  22,rd. — "  I  thank  God  I  yet  continue  much 
better  since  I  left  town  :  I  know  not  how  long  it  may 
last.  I  am  sure  it  has  done  me  some  good  for  the 
present.  I  do  not  totter  as  I  did,  but  walk  firm  as 
a  rock,  only  once  or  twice  for  a  minute.  I  do  not 
know  how,  but  it  went  off  and  I  never  followed  it." 

[Summer  excessively  hot.  Swift  suffered  ex- 
tremely.] "  I  never  impute  any  illness  or  health  I 
have  to  good  or  ill  weather,  but  to  want  of  exercise 
and  ill  air,  or  something  I  have  eaten,  or  hard  study, 
or  sitting  up,  and  so  I  fence  against  these  as  well  as 
I  can."    [Returned  to  London  in  July.] 

"  I  fear  I  shall  have  the  gout ;  I  sometimes  feel 
pain  about  my  feet  and  toes.  I  never  drank  till 
within  two  years,  and  I  did  it  to  cure  my  head.  I 
often  sit  evenings  with  some  of  these  people,  and 
drink  in  my  turn  :  but  I  am  now  resolved  to  drink 
ten  times  less  than  before  :  but  the}'  advise  me  to  let 
what  I  drink  be  all  wine,  and  not  to  put  water  in  it." 

Sept  ist.  —  "My  head  is  pretty  well,  only  a 
sudden  turn  at  any  time  makes  me  feel  giddy  for 
a  moment,  and  sometimes  it  feels  very  stupid,  but  if 
it  grows  no  worse  I  can  bear  it  very  well." 


FINALE  311 

[Scviffs  deafness  at  first  was  in  one  ear.] 

7//;.  — "  Did  I  ever  tell  you  that  the  Lord 
Treasurer  hears  ill  with  the  left  ear  just  as  I  do? 
He  always  turns  to  the  right :  and  his  servants 
whisper  to  him  in  that  only.  I  dare  not  tell  him  I 
am  so  too,  for  fear  that  he  should  think  I  counter- 
feited to  make  my  court." 

8ih. — "God  be  thanked  my  head  continues  pretty 
well." 

October  2ist. — "My  head  has  ached  a  little  in  the 
evenings,  but  it  is  not  of  the  giddy  sort,  so  I  do  not 
much  value  it." 

2^th. — "  I  had  a  little  turn  in  my  head  this  morn- 
ing, which  though  it  did  not  last  above  a  minute,  yet, 
being  of  the  truer  sort,  has  made  me  as  weak  as  a 
dog  all  this  day.  It  is  the  first  I  have  had  this  half- 
year." 

Nov.  4fh. — "  I  plainly  find  I  have  less  twitchings 
about  my  toes  since  these  ministers  are  sick  and  out- 
of-town,  and  that  I  don't  drink  with  them." 

[During  the  next  three  months  one  serious  return 
of  his  disorder.] 

1712.  Feb.  24th. — "I  dined  with  the  Secretary,  and 
found  my  head  very  much  out  of  order,  but  no 
absolute  fit,  and  I  have  not  been  well  all  this  day.  It 
has  shook  me  a  little.  I  sometimes  sit  up  at  Lord 
Masham's,  and  have  writ  much  for  several  days  past, 
but  I  will  mend  both." 

Mar.  2gth. — "Attack  similar  to  eczema  and  rheu- 
matism, Herpes." 

May  \otJi. — "Pain  still  continues  in  shoulder" 


312  DEAN   SWIFT 

"  I  can  never  be  sick  (ill)  in  the  common  way ;  and 
as  to  your  other  notion  of  it  coming  without  pain,  it 
neither  came  nor  stayed,  nor  went,  without  pain,  and 
the  most  pain  I  ever  bore  in  my  life. 

"  I  drink  nothing  above  wine  and  water. 

"  My  left  hand  is  very  weak  and  trembles,  but  my 
right  side  has  not  been  touched." 

Sisi. — "  My  pains  continuing  still,  though  with  less 
violence." 

Jtmc  lyth. — "  My  shoulder  is  a  great  deal  better, 
however,  I  feel  violent  pain  in  it,  but  I  think  it 
diminishes,  and  I  have  cut  off  some  slices  from  my 
flannel." 

[Attack  of  herpes  left  him  very  weak.] 

September. — "I  have  eat,"  he  says,  "mighty  little 
fruit,  yet  I  impute  my  disorder  to  that  little,  and  shall 
henceforth  wholly  forbear  it." 

Oct  gth. — "  I  have  left  Windsor  these  lo  days. 

"  I  find  my  head  much  better  than  it  was.  I  was 
very  much  discouraged,  for  I  used  to  be  ill  for  three 
or  four  days  together,  ready  to  totter  as  I  walked.  I 
take  8  pills  a  day,  and  have  taken,  I  believe,  150 
already." 

28//L — "  I  have  been  in  physic  this  month,  and  have 
been  better  these  three  weeks.  I  stopped  my  physic, 
by  the  Doctor's  orders,  till  he  sends  me  further 
directions." 

[During  the  next  three  months  remained  free  from 
any  attacks.] 

^7^Z-  J<^^^-  ^'2'th. — [He  tried  Spa  waters  :  increased 
the  vertigo  and  produced  oedema  of  the  legs.] 


FINALE  313 

"Took  preparation — Pulvis  Aloes  c,  Canella. 

"  Hiera  Picra — two  spoonfuls — 
"devilish  stuff!" 

Beg.  May. — [Appointed  Dean  of  St.  Patrick's, 
returned  to  Ireland  towards  the  end  of  the  month.] 

July  16//;.— [To  Archbishop  King.]  "  I  have  been 
so  extremely  ill  with  the  return  of  an  old  disorder  in 
my  head  that  I  was  unable  to  write  to  your  Grace." 

[Confined  to  his  rooms  at  this  period  for  a  fort- 
night, but  appears  to  have  recovered  his  health  by  a 
short  sojourn  at  his  former  parish,  where  Stella  then 
resided.] 

"  But  was  so  dirty,  pale  and  thin 
Old  Read  would  hardly  let  him  in." 

"Bad  attack  of  despondency." 

[1714-1719. — Scanty  means  of  ascertaining  his 
state.] 

Dec,  1718. — Dr.  Arbuthnot  writes  to  him,  "Glad 
at  my  heart  I  should  be  if  Dr.  Helsham  or  I  could 
do  you  any  good.  My  service  to  Dr.  Helsham ;  he 
does  not  want  my  advice  in  the  case.  I  have  done 
good  lately  to  a  patient  and  a  friend  in  that  complaint 
of  a  vertigo,  by  cinnabar  of  antimony  and  castor  made 
up  into  boluses  with  confection  of  alkermes.  I  had 
no  great  opinion  of  the  cinnabar,  but  trying  it  among 
other  things,  my  friend  found  good  of  this  prescrip- 
tion. I  had  tried  the  castor  alone  before,  but  not 
with  so  much  success.  Small  quantities  of  Tinctura 
Sacra  now  and  then  will  do  you  good." 

1719-    y^^^-    ^th-Fcb.    igth. — "Confined    by    severe 
attack." 


314  DEAN   SWIFT 

May. — "  My  health  is  somewhat  undecided,  but  at 
best  I  have  an  ill-head  and  an  aching  heart." 

1720. — [Political  activity  had  salutary  effect  on  his 
body — dispelled  his  melancholy.  Deafness  distress- 
ing.] "What  if  I  should  add,"  he  says,  "that  once  in 
five  or  six  weeks  I  am  deaf  for  three  or  four  days." 

May. — [Severe  attack  of  ague,  incapacitated  him 
from  writing.]  "  I  am  still  under  the  discipline  of  the 
bark  to  prevent  relapses." 

1721,  S^'j^.— [Removed  to  Gaulstown  for  his  health.] 

"  I  have  now  and  then  some  threatenings  with  my 
head :  but  have  never  been  absolutely  giddy  above  a 
minute,  and  cannot  complain  of  my  health,  I  thank 
God."     [^Allusion  to  health  in  writing  to  Vanessa.'] 

July  isth,  1 72 1. — "  If  you  knew  how  I  struggle  for 
a  little  health,  what  uneasiness  I  am  at  in  riding  and 
walking,  and  refraining  from  everything  agreeable  to 
my  taste,  you  would  think  it  but  a  small  thing  to  take 
a  walk  now  and  then  and  converse  with  fools  and 
impertinents  to  avoid  spleen  and  sickness." 

1722. — [To  the  country  for  the  benefit  of  the  air.] 

/nly  13///. — "  I  fiy  from  the  spleen  to  the  world's  end. 

"  I  gave  all  possible  way  to  amusements,  because 
they  preserve  my  temper  as  exercise  does  my  health : 
and  without  health  and  good  humour  I  would  rather 
be  a  dog.  I  have  shifted  scenes  oftener  than  I  ever 
did  in  my  life,  and  believe  I  have  lain  in  thirty  beds 
since  I  left  the  town." 

1723.  Feb. — [Gay  entreats  him  to  come  to 
England  for  change  of  air  and  says,  "  Dr.  Arbuthnot 
thinks  that  your  going  to  Spa  and  drinking  the  water 


FINALE  315 

there,  would  be  of  great  service  to  you,  if  you  have 
resolution  enough  to  take  the  journey."] 

1724.  September. — [Writes  to  Lord  Carteret] 
"Being  ten  years  older  than  when  I  had  the  pleasure 

to  see  your  excellency  last,  by  consequence,  if  I  am 
subject  to  any  ailments,  they  are  now  ten  times  worse, 
and  so  it  has  happened,  for  I  have  been  now  this 
month  past  so  pestered  with  a  return  of  the  noise  and 
deafness  in  my  ears  that  I  had  not  spirit  to  perform 
the  common  offices  of  life." 

1725.  April. — [Complains  bitterly  of  these  two 
symptoms.] 

Aug.—"  My  deafness  has  left  me  above  three  weeks, 
and  therefore  I  expect  a  visit  from  it  soon :  and  it  is 
somewhat  less  vexatious  here  in  the  country,  because 
none  are  about  me  but  those  who  are  used  to  it." 

Aug.— [Tells  Mr.  Tickell,  son  to  Surgeon-General 
of  that  time,  that  he  had  been  tormented  with  an  odd 
vexatious  disorder  of  a  deafness  and  noise  in  his  ears 
which,  he  continues,  "  has  returned  after  having  left 
me  above  two  years,  and  makes  me  insupportable  to 
others  and  myself." 

[Left  him  in  September.] 

Oct—"  I  am  fit  for  nothing  but  to  mope  in  my 
chamber." 

Nov.—"  I  have  got  slowly  out  of  a  favourite  dis- 
order that  hath  confined  me  there  10  days." 

Nov.  13//-!.— [Could  enjoy  the  society  of  a  few 
friends.] 

1726.— [Visited  London.  Illness  of  Stella — and 
recovery. 


3i6  DEAN   SWIFT 

Swift  gets  rid  of  giddiness  at  Holyhead. 

Returned  to  London.] 

JunCj  1727. — "My  stomach  pretty  good,  but  for 
some  days  my  head  has  not  been  right — yet  it  is 
what  I  have  been  formerly  used  to." 

July. — [Decided  attack.] 

Aug. — [Deafness  increased  to  greater  extent  than 
he  had  before  experienced — giddiness  and  tottering. 

Could  not  write  for  any  length  of  time.] 

"  I  believe  this  giddiness  is  the  disorder  that  will 
at  last  get  the  better  of  me." 

1727. — [Went  to  Twickenham. 

Unmanned  by  last  account  of  Stella's  illness.'] 

"  My  weakness,  my  age,  my  friendship,  will  bear 
no  more." 

"  I  walk  like  a  drunken  man,  and  am  deafer  than 
ever  you  knew  me.  These  are  the  perquisites  of 
living  long  :  the  last  act  of  life  is  always  a  tragedy  at 
best,  for  it  is  a  bitter  aggravation  to  have  one's  best 
friend  go  before  them." 

Stella's  death. — [Friends  in  Ireland  wrote  in  alarm  to 
Pope  about  Swift's  depression.] 

Jan.  2Stk,  1728. — [Despair  after  Stella's  death. 
Vide  Johnson,  "  Life  of  Swift." 

Designed  to  pass  the  winter  in  South  of  France.] 

Sept.  i8tk.—{To  Dr.  Sheridan  (Armagh).]  "My 
continuance  here  is  partly  owing  to  indolence,  and 
partly  to  my  hatred  to  Dublin.  I  am  in  a  middling 
way,  between  healthy  and  sick,  hardly  ever  without 
giddiness  or  deafness,  and  sometimes  both." 

1729. — [Another    very    severe    attack — continued 


FINALE  317 

throughout  January,  Some  months  now  without  any 
decided  attack — yet  his  head  was  never  free  from 
giddiness. 

After  1730. — Sank  in  spirits — friends  aware  of 
this.] 

1731-  June  12th. — [To  Pope:]  "I  doubt  habit  has 
little  power  to  reconcile  us  with  sickness  attended  by 
pain.  I  was  growing  less  patient  with  solitude,  and 
harder  to  be  pleased  with  company  which  I  could 
formerly  better  digest  when  I  could  be  easier  without 
it  than  at  present.  I  grow  every  day  more  averse 
from  writing,  which  is  natural,  and  when  I  take  a  pen, 
say  to  myself  a  thousand  times  *  Non  est  tanti.'  My 
poetical  fountain  is  drained,  and  I  profess,  I  grow 
gradually  so  dry,  that  a  rhyme  with  me  is  almost  as 
hard  to  find  as  a  guinea :  and  even  prose  speculations 
tire  me  almost  as  much." 

29///. — [To  Gay:]  "The  giddiness  I  was  subject 
to,  instead  of  coming  seldom  and  violent,  now  con- 
stantly attends  me  more  or  less,  though  in  a  more 
peaceable  manner,  yet  such  as  will  not  qualify  me  to 
live  among  the  young  and  healthy." 

[Conscious  of  the  peevishness  of  his  temper,] 

"  Vertiginosus,  inops,  surdus,  male  gratus  amicis." 

173 1.   Nov. — [Wrote  the  verses  on  his  own  death.] 

See  how  the  Dean  begins  to  break 
Poor  gentleman  he  droops  apace, 
You  plainly  find  it  in  his  face  ; 
That  old  vertigo  in  his  head 
Will  never  leave  him  till  he's  dead. 
Besides  his  memory  decays 
He  recollects  not  what  he  says. 


3i8  DEAN   SWIFT 

1732. — [Hurt  his  leg  and  was  lame  afterwards.] 

1733.  Feb. — "  I  am  just  recovering  of  two  cruel 
indispositions  of  giddiness  and  deafness  after  7 
months.  I  have  got  my  hearing :  but  the  other  evil 
still  clings  about  me,  and  I  doubt  will  never  quite  leave 
me  until  I  leave  it."    [Continued  until  March  20th.] 

[Death  of  Gay  increased  his  despondency.] 

"  I  humdrum  it  either  on  horseback  or  driving,  or 
sitting  the  evening  at  home,  endeavouring  to  write, 
but  write  nothing,  merely  out  of  indolence  and  want 
of  spirits." 

[Despondency  increased  during  the  last  months  of 
this  year.] 

1734- — [Improved  in  health,  spirits  and  appearance, 
though  indolence  and  apathy  increased. 

Regimen  simple — no  tea  or  coffee.] 

1734,  Nov. — [Tottering  again  returned — eyesight 
began  to  fail — refused  to  wear  spectacles. 

N.B. — Writings  and  conversation  at  this  time 
exhibit  no  trace  of  insanity.] 

1735*  Nov.— {Ltii^r  to  Alderman  Barber.] 

"As  to  myself,  I  am  grown  leaner  than  you  were 
when  we  parted  last,  and  I  am  never  wholly  free  from 
giddiness,  weakness,  and  sickness  in  my  stomach, 
otherwise  I  should  have  been  among  you  two  or 
three  years  ago,  but  now  I  despair  of  that  happiness. 

"  But  my  fortune  is  so  sunk,  that  I  cannot  afford 
half  the  necessaries  or  conveniences  that  I  can  still 
make  a  shift  to  provide  myself  with  here. 

"  You  see  by  my  very  blottings  and  intertwinings 
what  a  condition  my  head  is  in. 


FINALE  319 

"  I  was  unable  to  attend  church  for  fear  of  being 
seized  with  a  fit  of  giddiness  in  the  midst  of  the 
service." 

[Designed  to  pass  the  winter  of  this  year  with 
Sheridan  at  Cavan.  Reached  Cavan  the  fourth  day, 
greatly  fatigued,  but  apparently  improved  in  spirits 
from  the  society  of  his  old  and  dear  friend.  It  con- 
stantly prevented  him  from  taking  the  usual  quantity 
of  exercise — made  him  fretful  and  uneasy.] 

1736,  Feb.— [Again  laid  up  with  serious  attack  : 
illness  disqualified  him  from  any  conversation— grew 
much  thinner.     Could  still  write  to  a  few  friends. 

All  early  friends  gone  except  Pope  and  Boling- 
broke.] 

1736,  November. — Sheridan  congratulates  Mrs. 
Whiteway  "upon  the  recovery  of  our  dear  friend, 
the  Dean."  During  this  interval  Swift  began  last 
literary  production  "  The  Legion  Club,"  had  to  leave 
it  half  finished  owing  to  sudden  attack. 

1736,  Dec.  2nd. — [To  Pope.]  "  I  have  not  been  in 
a  condition  to  write :  years  and  infirmities  have 
quite  broken  me :  I  mean  that  odious  continual  dis- 
order in  my  head  :  I  neither  read  nor  write, 
nor  remember,  nor  converse :  all  I  have  left  is  to 
walk  and  ride :  the  first  I  can  do  tolerably :  but  the 
latter,  for  want  of  good  weather  at  this  season,  is 
seldom  in  my  power :  and  having  not  an  ounce  of 
flesh  about  me,  my  skin  comes  off  in  ten  miles  riding 
because  my  skin  and  bones  cannot  agree  together." 

1737, — "I  am  forced  to  tell  you  my  health  is  much 
decayed ;  my  giddiness  and  deafness  more  frequent : 


320  DEAN   SWIFT 

spirits  I  have  none  left :  my  memory  is  almost  gone, 
the  public  corruptions  in  both  kingdoms  allow  me 
no  peace  or  quiet  of  mind.  I  sink  every  day,  and 
am  older  by  twenty  years  than  many  others  of  the 
same  age. 

"  Besides  I  can  hardly  write  ten  lines  without 
twenty  blunders,  as  you  will  see  by  the  number  of 
scratchings  and  blots  before  this  letter  is  done.  Into 
the  bargain  I  have  not  one  rag  of  memory,  and  my 
friends  have  all  forsaken  me,  except  Mrs.  Whiteway, 
who  preserves  some  pity  for  my  condition,  and  a 
few  others  who  love  wine  that  costs  them  nothing. 

"  I  have  not  an  ounce  of  flesh  or  a  dram  of  spirits 
left  me — yet  my  greatest  load  is  not  my  years  but  my 
infirmities." 

1738,  Jan.  —  [Alderman  Barber.]  "I  have  for 
almost  three  years  been  only  the  shadow  of  my 
former  self,  with  years  of  sickness,  and  rage  against 
all  public  proceedings,  especially  in  this  miserably 
oppressed  country.  /  have  entirely  lost  my  memory, 
except  when  it  is  roused  by  perpetual  subjects  of 
vexation." 

{N.B. — Strong  feeling  that  he  will  be  reduced  to 
similar  state  of  idiocy  as  Somers,  Marlborough,  etc. 
When  he  cited  these  melancholy  instances  it  was 
always  with  a  heavy  sigh,  and  with  gestures  that 
showed  great  uneasiness,  as  he  felt  an  impulse  of 
what  was  to  happen  to  him  before  he  died. 

Excess  of  wine — though  conscious  of  its  injurious 
effect — for  he  always  adopted  a  course  of  abstemious- 
ness when  he  had  returned  from  his  giddiness.] 


FINALE  321 

1738. — All  the  worst  symptoms  continued  without 
intermission  during  this  year,  so  that  his  friends 
thought  he  could  not  long  survive. 

N.B. — Correspondence  shows  that  his  affections 
were  warmer  than  is  usual  with  persons  of  his  time 
of  life,  and  his  intellect  clearer.] 

1740,  April  2gth. — "  I  am  at  this  instant  unable  to 
move  without  excessive  pain,  although  not  loooth 
part  of  what  I  suffered  all  last  night,  and  this 
morning," 

[Yet  could  give  a  dinner  party  within  a  fortnight 
after. 

He  used  to  forget  the  names  of  his  friends,  even 
of  those  who  visited  him  twice  a  week.  As  his 
deafness  increased  his  bodily  health  became  better.] 

"  I  have  been  very  miserable  all  night,  and  to-day 
extremely  deaf  and  full  of  pain.  I  was  so  stupid  and 
confounded  that  I  cannot  express  the  mortification  I 
am  under  both  in  body  and  mind.  All  I  can  say 
is,  that  I  am  not  in  torture ;  but  I  daily  and  hourly 
expect  it.  Pray  let  me  know  how  your  health  is 
and  your  family,  I  hardly  understand  one  word  I 
write.  I  am  sure  my  days  will  be  very  few,  and 
few  and  miserable  they  must  be.  If  I  do  not 
blunder,  it  is  Saturday,  July  26th,  1740.  If  I  live  till 
Monday  I  shall  hope  to  see  you  perhaps  for  the  last 
time." 

1741.  Jan  izth. — [Perhaps  the  last  document  (to 
Mrs.  Whiteway)  that  he  ever  penned. 

Occasional  entries  in  his  account  books  made  as 
late  as  1742. 

Y 


322  DEAN    SWIFT 

During  his  reputed  insanity  he  wrote  the  follow- 
ing lines — 

"  Behold  !  a  proof  of  Irish  sense 
Here  Irish  wit  is  seen  ! 
When  nothing's  left  that's  worth  defence, 
We  build  a  magazine," 

N.B.  Only  one  of  his  non-medical  biographers  saw 
him  during  the  last  three  years  of  his  life.] 

1742. —  [Said  to  have  given  way  to  outburst  of 
passion — violent  to  one  of  his  clergy.  From  this 
period  his  complete  loss  of  memory  may  be  dated,  and 
inability  to  manage  his  own  affairs.] 

It  is  with  the  years  1742-1745  that  we  are  chiefly 
concerned  in  refuting  the  charge  of  madness.  During 
these  years  Swift  was  unable  to  manage  his  own 
affairs  and  was  under  the  care  of  Dr.  Lyons.  It  was 
during  this  time  that  he  dedicated  the  greater  part  of 
his  fortune  to  the  foundation,  after  his  death,  of  the 
asylum  known  then  as  Swift's  Asylum,  now  as  St. 
Patrick's  Hospital.  Very  shortly  after  this  he  fell  into 
a  stupor,  from  which  it  was  impossible  to  rouse  him. 
A  few  sayings  of  his  are  recorded  of  this  time.  It  is 
unnecessary  to  repeat  them  here.  What  is  more  to 
our  purpose  is  the  fact  that,  according  to  the  authority 
of  Deane  Swift,  his  cousin.  Swift  never  during  this 
time  made  a  foolish  remark.  His  utterances  were 
morbid,  gloomy,  sullen,  but  always  connected,  and 
containing  direct  bearing  on  the  subject  in  hand.  It 
is  unnecessary  to  dwell  on  these  painful  details.  A 
few  months  before  his  death  Swift  was  attacked  by 


^';liS 


FINALE  323 

a  tumour  on  one  eye,  which  caused  him  the  most 
excruciating  agony  and  roused  him  for  the  time. 
When  the  pains  had  subsided  he  sank  once  more 
into  a  stupor,  and  died  without  speaking  again  on 
October  19,  1745. 

Faulkner's  Dublin  Journal,  October  22,  1745, 
contained  the  following  obituary  notice — 

"  Last  Saturday,  at  3  o'clock  in  the  afternoon,  died 
that  great  and  eminent  patriot,  the  Rev.  Dr.  Jonathan 
Swift,  Dean  of  St.  Patrick's,  Dublin,  in  the  seventy- 
eighth  year  of  his  age,  who  was  born  in  the  parish  of 
St.  Werburgh's,  Dublin,  the  30th  of  Nov.,  1667,  at  his 
uncle  Councillor  Godwin  Swift's  house  in  Hoey's 
Alley,  which  in  those  times  was  the  general  residence 
of  the  chief  lawyers.  His  genius,  works,  learning 
and  charity  are  so  universally  admired  that  for  a 
newswriter  to  attempt  his  character  would  be  the 
highest  presumption:  yet,  as  the  printer  hereof  is 
proud  to  acknowledge  his  infinite  obligation  to  that 
prodigy  of  wit,  he  can  only  lament  that  he  is  by  no 
means  equal  to  so  bold  an  undertaking." 

Words,  too,  must  fail  us.  We  have  just  witnessed 
the  passing  of  a  great  soul  to  that  haven  where  he  can 
no  longer  be  assailed  by  criticism. 

"  Ubi  saeva  indignatio 
Cor  ulterius  lacerare  nequit." 

His  own  righteous  anger  at  the  wrongs  of  mankind 
are  at  an  end.  The  life  of  pain,  mental,  moral  and 
physical,  is  over.  Surely  few  men  have  suffered  so 
much.     Few   have   deserved   to  suffer  so  little.     He 


324  DEAN   SWIFT 

was  crucified  by  the  sufferings  of  his  fellow-creatures. 
Knowing  himself  to  be  a  soul  apart,  he  lived  a  lonely 
solitary  life,  though  for  happiness  he  depended,  more 
than  most  people,  on  the  affection  of  others.  A  sense 
of  vocation  inspired  him  throughout  his  life.  A 
feeling  that  he  had  duties  to  perform,  greater  than 
the  majority,  taught  him  that  their  small  interests  were 
not  for  him,  that  he  must  enter  greater  lists.  Knowing 
his  danger,  fully  aware  of  the  risk  of  failure,  he  entered 
the  greatest  lists  that  any  man  can  enter — and  failed. 
On  this  field  few  have  entered  and  none  have  been 
known  to  succeed.  Surely  we  must  give  the  greater 
honour  to  the  few.  They  have  staked  everything  and 
lost  everything. 

What  is  their  reward  ? 


APPENDIX 

Extract  frovt  a  paper  in  Brain,  Vol.  IV.,  January,  1882. 
By  kind  permission  of  the  Editors  and  the  Publishers,  Messrs. 
Macinillan  &^   Co. 

DEAN    SWIFT'S    DISEASE 

By  the  late  Dr.  BUCKNILL,  F.R.S. 

"  Upon  weighing  the  evidence,  it  will  probably  be  acknowledged 
that  Jonathan  Swift's  mysterious  illness  was  an  instance  of  that 
curious  form  of  disease,  Labyrinthine  Vertigo  or  Le  Maladie  de 
Meniere  .  .  .  first  described  in  186 1. 

The  most  descriptive  passage  of  his  life-long  complaint  is 
to  be  found  in  his  "Journal  to  Stella,"  October  31,  1710. 
"  This  morning,  sitting  in  my  bed,  I  had  a  fit  of  giddiness,  the 
room  turned  round  for  about  a  minute,  and  then  it  went  off, 
leaving  me  sickish,  but  not  very.  I  saw  Dr.  Cockburn  to-day, 
and  he  promises  to  send  me  the  pills  that  did  me  good  last 
year;  and  likewise  has  promised  me  an  oil  for  my  ears,  that 
he  has  been  making  for  that  ailment  for  somebody  else." 

January,  171 1. — "I  had  an  ugly  fit  in  my  chamber  last 
night."  "  My  head  is  not  in  order  and  yet  is  not  absolutely  ill, 
but  giddyish,  and  makes  me  listless." 

April  iSth. — "  I  did  not  go  to  the  House  of  Commons 
about  the  yarn ;  my  head  was  not  well  enough  .  .  .  two  days 
together  giddy  from  morning  till  night  and  I  totter  a  little  but 
can  make  a  shift  to  walk." 

September  li-/.— "  My  head  is  pretty  well ;  only  a  sudden 
turn  at  any  time  makes  me  feel  giddy  for  a  moment,  and 
sometimes  it  feels  very  stuffed." 

325 


326  DEAN   SWIFT 

In  1720  he  writes,  "  What  if  I  should  add  that  once  in 
five  or  six  weeks  I  am  deaf  for  three  or  four  days." 

In  1724. — "I  have  been  this  month  past  so  pestered  with 
a  return  of  the  noise  and  deafness  in  my  ears  that  I  had  not 
the  spirit  to  perform  the  common  offices  of  life."  Later  in 
the  same  year,  "  My  deafness  has  left  me  above  three  weeks, 
and  therefore  I  expect  a  visit  from  it  soon."  It  was  evidently 
periodic  and  paroxysmal,  like  the  giddiness. 

In  1727,  in  a  letter  to  Sheridan,  he  says  that  his  deafness 
is  worse  than  it  ever  before  had  been,  and  that  it  is  accompanied 
by  giddiness  and  tottering.  "  I  walk  like  a  drunken  man  and 
am  deafer  than  ever  you  knew  me." 

In  1728,  in  "about  eight  months,"  says  Wilde,  "he  had 
half  a  dozen  attacks  of  the  giddiness  and  sickness,  each  of 
which  lasted  about  three  weeks."  In  1731  he  wrote  to  Mr. 
Gay,  "The  giddiness  I  was  subject  to,  instead  of  coming 
seldom  and  violent,  now  constantly  attended  me  more  or  less, 
though  in  a  more  peaceable  manner,  yet  such  as  will  not  qualify 
me  to  live  among  the  young  and  healthy."  In  1736  he  wrote 
to  Pope,  "  Years  and  infirmities  have  quite  broke  me.  I  mean 
that  continual  disorder  in  my  head."  In  1737  to  Alderman 
Barker,  "  I  am  forced  to  tell  you  my  health  is  much  decayed ; 
my  deafness  and  giddiness  more  frequent ;  spirits  I  have  none 
left;  my  memory  is  almost  gone."  Impairment  of  memory  he 
had  complained  of  as  early  as  17 13,  and  later  on  in  the  same 
year  he  speaks  of  his  horrible  melancholy  changing  into  dulness. 
.  .  .  Not  that  he  was  at  any  time  really  of  unsound  mind  or 
incapable  :  for  when  in  1737  in  the  Bettes worth  affair  a  gratifying 
address  was  presented  to  him,  it  is  recorded  that,  "  when  this 
paper  was  delivered  Swift  was  in  bed,  giddy  and  deaf,  having 
been  some  time  before  seized  with  one  of  his  fits :  but  he 
dictated  an  answer  in  which  there  is  all  the  dignity  of  habitual 
pre-eminence  and  all  the  resignation  of  humble  piety." 

These  extracts  afford  conclusive  evidence,  I  venture  to 
think,    that    he    suffered    for    twenty    years   from   the  disease 


APPENDIX  327 

whose  characteristic  symptoms  are  "  that  the  patient  is  suddenly 
seized  with  vertigo,  nausea,  depression,  and  faintness.  Usually 
the  giddiness  comes  on  simultaneously  with  ringing  or  buzzing 
in  one,  or  it  may  be,  both  ears." 

Up  to  the  date  to  which  we  have  traced  the  progress  of  the 
disease,  it  appears  to  have  been  purely  a  physical  malady,  with 
no  mental  symptoms,  unless  some  degree  of  loss  of  memory 
can  be  so  called.  Swift,  indeed,  complains  bitterly  of  the 
impairment,  as  if  memory  were  gone,  and  in  his  declining  years 
of  age  and  sickness  it  may  have  been  a  dull  function  compared 
with  the  brilliant  faculty  he  once  possessed.  But  clearly  the  memory 
was  still  serviceable,  which  enabled  him  to  compose,  with  wonder- 
ful vivacity,  even  such  poetry  as  that  outburst  against  political 
and  social  corruption,  "  The  Legion  Club," — which  Jeffrey 
thinks  "  deserving  of  attention  as  the  most  thoroughly  animated, 
fierce  and  energetic  of  all  Swift's  metrical  compositions;  and 
though  the  animation  be  altogether  of  a  ferocious  character, 
and  seems  occasionally  to  verge  upon  absolute  insanity,  there 
is  still  a  force  and  a  terror  about  it  which  redeems  it  from 
ridicule  and  makes  us  shudder  at  the  sort  of  demoniacal  inspiration 
with  which  the  malison  is  vented."  This  poem,  written  in  1736, 
was  his  last  work ;  its  appreciation  by  his  most  hostile  critic 
will  show  how  little  he  suffered  from  loss  of  any  mental  faculty 
when  he  wrote  it  .  .  .  that  there  was  any  failure  of  mind  this 
"Legion  Club"  fully  disproves,  and  if  fiercely  expressed  hatred 
is  any  evidence  that  an  author  is  on  the  verge  of  insanity,  Jeffrey 
must  have  been  curiously  insensible  to  the  testimony  he  was 
bearing  against  his  own  soundness  of  mind  in  his  criticism  of 
the  greater  master  of  his  own  art.  .  .  .  Misery  and  despondency 
there  was,  more  than  enough,  but  not  madness,  unless  Job  was 
mad.  .  .  .  He  died  October  19,  1745,  in  the  seventy-eighth  year  of 
his  age,  without  the  least  pang  or  convulsion  according  to  Lord 
Orrery,  but  according  to  Faulkner,  "  in  great  agony  with  strong 
convulsive  fits." 

From  the  plaster  cast  of  Swift's  head  a  layman,  Sir  Walter 


328  DEAN   SWIFT 

Scott,  has  learnt  that  "  the  expression  is  most  unequivocally 
maniacal,  and  one  side  of  the  mouth  horribly  contorted  down- 
wards, as  if  in  pain ; "  from  the  same  cast  the  surgeon,  Sir  William 
Wilde,  that  "  the  expression  is  remarkably  placid,  but  there  is 
an  evident  drag  on  the  left  side  of  the  mouth,  exhibiting  a 
paralysis  of  the  facial  muscles,  to  the  right  side." 

The  cast  has  brought  to  light  the  fact  that  he  suffered  from 
a  right-sided  hemiplegia  accompanied  by  that  form  of  aphasia 
in  which  scraps  of  reasonable  language  come  automatically, 
though  intentional  effort  can  produce  no  words. 

Thus,  in  Mr.  Deane  Swift's  letter  dated  April  4,  1744,  "he 
sat  rocking  himself  in  a  chair  saying,  '  I  am  what  I  am,  1  am 
what  I  am,'  "  "  he  will  speak  incoherent  words,  but  he  never 
yet,  as  far  as  I  could  hear,  talked  nonsense  or  said  a  foolish 
thing  ...  he  again  endeavoured,  with  a  great  deal  of  pain,  to 
find  words  to  speak  to  me;  at  last,  not  being  able,  after  many 
efforts,  he  gave  a  heavy  sigh  and  was  afterwards  silent." 

We  can  now  diagnose  his  lifelong  disease  as  labyrinthine 
vertigo  and  his  insanity  as  dementia  with  aphasia,  the  dementia 
arising  from  general  decay  of  the  brain  from  age  and  disease, 
the  paralysis  and  aphasia  from  affections  of  one  particular  part 
of  the  brain.  With  all  the  tortures  of  the  lifelong  disease  from 
which  he  suffered,  and  its  obvious  effects  upon  his  temper  in 
his  later  years,  it  is  wonderful  that  Swift  did  retain  his  reason 
until,  in  the  seventy-fourth  year  of  his  age,  he  was  in  all  probability 
struck  down  by  a  new  disease  in  the  form  of  a  localized  left- 
sided  apoplexy  or  cerebral  softening,  which  determined  the 
symptoms  of  his  insanity. 

That  Swift's  works  contain  no  indications  of  insanity  appears 
to  me  certain.  As  well  say  that  Shakespeare  was  mad  because 
he  wrote  a  good  deal  which  we  think  nasty.  In  the  fashion 
of  the  day  Swift  was  too  prone  to  make  what  may  be  called 
excrementitious  jokes  and  jibes.  But  that  perfect  gentleman, 
Antonio,  voided  his  rheum  upon  Shylock's  beard ;  and  the 
same  kind  of  thing  runs  through  our  literature,  no  one  objecting, 


APPENDIX  329 

until  we  rather  recently  began  to  become  less  natural  and 
more  nice.  Some  of  our  smaller  humorists  and  men  of  letters 
have  criticized  this  great  king  of  humour  as  if  he  were  both  bad 
and  mad,  not  perceiving  that  if  he  were  really  insane  he  must 
be  pitied  and  not  cursed.  But  it  is  the  weakest  of  arguments 
to  say,  with  Festus,  for  want  of  argument,  ''  Much  learning  doth 
make  thee  mad."  There  is  always  weakness  in  madness,  but 
there  is  little  sign  of  this  in  Swift's  works.  There  is  always 
some  inconsequence  or  incoherence  in  madness,  but  there 
is  none  of  this  in  Swift. 


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AlTKEN,   G.   A.     . 

Arbuthnot,  John 

Athenian  Oracle. 

Barn HAM    .         .         .        . 

Barrett,  Dr. 

Behn,  Aphra 
Beddoes,  T.  L.    . 
Berkeley,  G.  Monck 

Birrell,  The  Hon.  Augus- 
tine       .        .        .        . 
Bolingbroke,  Viscount     . 
Browne      .        .        .        . 

BUCKNILL,   Dr.    . 


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Brimley  Johnson. 
Essays.     Life  and  Genius  of  Swift. 
Charles  IL 
Life  of  Arbuthnot. 
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John  Bull. 

Cavallero  Swyfte. 

Essay  on  Earlier    Part  of  Swift's 

Life. 
New  Atalantis. 
Hygeia.     Essay  IX. 
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of  Dean  Swift. 

Essays. 
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Essays.     The  Characteristics. 
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1882. 


Carleton,  Captain    .        .     Memoirs. 

Chetwode,  Knightly         .     Swift's  Correspondence  with 

Churton,  Collins,  Prof,  .     Jonathan  Swift. 

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Congregation  Book,  Trinity  College,  Dublin. 

331 


332 


DEAN   SWIFT 


COURTENAY,      ThOS.      PERE- 
GRINE        .  .  .  . 

CouRTHOPE,  William 
Croker,    The  Hon,   John 
Wilson    .        .        .        . 
Defoe,  Daniel  . 


Introduction  to  Temple's  Letters. 
Life  of  Addison.     E.  M.  L. 


Delany,  Dr.  Patrick 
Delany,  Mrs.  Mary  . 


Tract. 

History  of  the  White  Staff. 

Advice  from  the  Scandalous  Club. 

True  Born  Englishman. 

Anonymous     Observations     upon 
Lord  Orrery's  Remarks. 

Autobiography    and    Correspond- 
ence with  Lady  Hanover. 
Dublin  Quarterly  Journal  of  Medical  Science,  1847. 
Dublin  University  Magazine,  1847. 

Faulkner,  Arthur    .         .     Dublin  Journal,  Oct.  22,  1745. 
Forster,  John   .        .         .     Life  of  Swift,  Vol.  I. 

Introduction  to  Swift's  Works. 

Historical  and  Biographical  Essays. 
Forster,  William      .        .     Letters. 
Eraser's  Magazine,  Feb.,  1847. 
Gentleman's  London  Magazine,  1757. 


Godley,  a.  C.    . 
Green,  Mrs.  R. 

Hawkesworth,  William 
Hill,  Birkbeck. 

Houston,  Dr.     . 

Howett,  William 

Jebb,  William    . 
Johnson,  Brimley 
Johnson,  Samuel 
King,  Richard  Ashe 


Oxford  in  the  XVIIIth  Century. 
The   Making  and    Unmaking    of 

Ireland. 
Memoirs. 
Unpublished     Letters     of     Dean 

Swift. 
Phrenological  Journal,  Miscellany, 

1846. 
Homes  and  Haunts  of  the  British 

Poets. 
Life  of  Bentley.     E.  M.  L. 
Eighteenth  Century  Letters. 
Lives  of  the  Poets. 
Swift  in  Ireland. 


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Lecky,  Hon.  W.  E.      .         .     Leaders  of  Public  Opinion. 

History  of  the  i8th  Century. 
The  EngHsh  in  Ireland. 
Leicestershire,  History  of,  Dublin,  1751. 
Letter  from  an  English  Traveller. 
Letter  from  a  Gentleman  in  the  Country  to  his  Son.     Trinity 

College,  Dublin. 
London  Medical  Gazette,  1835. 

Remarks   on    Dr.    Hawkesworth's 

Memoirs. 
Sir    William    Temple,    Stanhope 

Prize  Essay,  1908. 
Essays. 

History   and    Antiquities    of    the 
Collegiate  and  Cathedral  Church 
of  St.  Patrick. 
Impurities  of  Genius. 
Swift's  Family. 
Life  of  Swift. 

The  Ancient  Laws  of  Ireland. 
Manners    and    Customs    of     the 

Ancient  Irish,  Vol.  I. 
Remarks  on  the  Life  and  Writings 

of  Dr.  Swift. 
Letters  of 
Essay  on  Swift. 
Memoirs. 

Factors  in  Modern  History. 
Works,  edited  by  Courthope. 
Letters  of  (cxviii.   Letters,  edited 

by  Brimley  Johnson). 
Swift  in  Ireland. 
Letters. 

Fortnightly,  June,  1909, 
Life  and  Works  of  Swift, 


Lyons,  Dr.  . 

LvTTEL,  Edward 

Macaulay,  Lord 
Mason,  William  Monck 


Madden,  Dr. 
Mercurius  Rusticus,  1685 
Moriarty,  R.     .        .        . 
McKenna,  Rev.  J.  E. 
O'Curry,  D.       .        .        . 

Orrery,  Lord   . 

Osborne,  Dorothy    . 
Paul,  Herbert  . 
PiLKiNGTON,  Mrs.  Letitia 
Pollard,  Prof.  A.  F. 
Pope,  Alexander 


Quarterly  Review,  vol.  186 
Richardson,  Samuel. 
Robertson,  F.  W. 
Scott,  Sir  Walter    . 


334 


DEAN   SWIFT 


Seeley,  Sir  J.  R. 
Sheridan,  Thomas     . 

SiCHEL,  W. 

Skai,  Dr.    . 

Smeaton,  W.  H. 
Social  England, 
"  Some  Memoirs  of  the 
Dean  by  a  Lady  who 

Spence 
Steele,  R. . 

Stephen,  Sir  Leslie. 


Swift,  Deane     . 
Swift,  Jonathan 


.     Growth  of  English  Policy. 

.     Life  of  Swift. 

.     Life  of  Bolingbroke. 

.    On  Swift's   Head.     Phrenological 

Journal. 
.     English  Satire. 

Amours  and  Intrigues  of  a  certain  Irish 
was  well-acquainted  with  him."     T.  C.  D. 
.    Anecdotes. 
.     Letters  edited  by  Brimley  Johnson. 

Papers  in  Spectator,  Tatler,  etc. 
.     Life  of  Swift.     E.  M.  L. 

Swift.     Diet,  of  Nat.  Biography. 
History    of    English    Thought    in 

XVHIth  Century. 
English  Utilitarians. 
English  Literature  and  Society  in 
XVIIIth  Century. 
.     Essay  upon  the  Life  of  Swift,  1755. 

Letters  of  Swift,  1710-1742. 
.     Fragments      of      Autobiography. 
Published  in  Forster's  Life. 
Later  Letters  (forming  Journal  to 

Stella). 
Works  and  Letters   by  Faulkner, 

1762. 
Prose  Works,     Edited  by  Temple 

Scott. 
Journal  to  Stella,  together  with 
other  writings  relating  to  Stella 
and  Vanessa.  (Published  by 
Newnes.) 
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of  Swift. 


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335 


Swift,  Jonathan 
Swiftiana. 
Taine,  H.   . 
Temple,  Sir  William 


Thackerav,  W.  M.    . 
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Woods,  Margaret  L. 


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History  of  the  City  of  Dublin. 
Letters. 
Closing    Years    of    Dean    Swift's 

Life. 
History   of    Great   Britain   during 

the  Reign  of  Queen  Anne. 
Hester  Vanhomrigh. 


INDEX 


Addison,  42,  44,  45,  58,  59,  60  ;  genius 

of,   62-66,    68,   88,   92,    102,    103  ; 

Swift's  assistance  to,  128  ;  opinion  of 

Swift,  141 
Aix  la  Chapelle,  peace  of,  16,  19,  20 
Anne,   Queen,   character   of,   45,  46 ; 

politics  in  reign  of,  7 1  ;  obstinacy  of, 

112,  117,  139,  289,  302 
Arbuthnot,   Dr.,    92,    130 ;   letter  to 

Swift,  131,  285  ;  his  life  and  works, 

286 
Argyle,  Duke  of,  107 
Arlington,  Lord,  14,  16 
Ashburnham,  Lady,  57 


B 


Barber,   Alderman,  .Swift's   letters  to, 

318,  320 
Berkeley,  Lord,  50,  53 
Berkeley,  Lady  Betty,  47 
Blount,  Mrs.  Martha,  285 
Boulter,  Archbishop  of  Armagh,  275 
Boyle,  Mr.,  his  "  Meditations,"  53  et 

seq. 
Breda,  Peace  of,  1 5,  18,  19 
Bucknill,   Dr.,   on   Swift's  illness,   v. 

Appendix 


Carteret,  Lord,  Lord-Lieutenant,  274  ; 

on  Swift's  influence  in  Dublin,  277 
Charles  II.,  15,  18,  20-23 
Clarendon,  Earl  of,  14 
Clubs,   Brother's,   43,   129  ;    Kit-Kat, 

63;   October,   112;   the   Scriblcrus, 

130,  131,  288 
Coffee  houses,  42,  43,  58 
Congreve,  58,  60-62,  128 
Craftsman,  the,  276 
Crisis,  the,  69 
Croker,  the  Hon.  J.,  on  Swift's  work 

in  Dublin,  278 


D 


Defoe,  67 
Delany,  Dr.,  2S5 
Delany,  Mrs.  46,  285 
Dingley,  Mrs.,  52,  156,  1 59  et  seq. 
Dover,  treaty  of,  20 
Down,  Bishopric  of,  133 
Dublin  Journal,    Faulkner's    obituary 
notice  of  Swift,  325 


Examiner,  the,  102  ;  attack  on  Marl- 
borough, no,  III 


Free/wider^  the,  6$ 


Gay,  130,  285,  314.  317.  318 
George  II.,  276 
Germaine,  Lady  Betty,  47 
Gififard,  Lady,  8,  13,  24,  36 
Godolphin,  75,  82,  88,  91,  116 
Grafton,  Duke  of,  Lord-Lieutenant  of 

Ireland,  260 
Guardian,  the,  68 
Guiscard,  Marquis  of,  II3-II5 


H 


llarcourt,  Sir  Simon,  Attorney- 
General,  87 

Harley,  Earl  of  Oxford,  45,  61  ;  dis- 
missal from  office,  82  ;  Chancellor  of 
Exchequer,  87,  89,  90,  91  ;  compared 
with  Bolingbroke,  91-101,  103,  106  ; 
attempted  assassination  of,  ii^etseq., 
117  ;  downfall  of,  138,  139;  Swift's 
affection  for,  145-147,  254,  255 


338 


DEAN   SWIFT 


Harley,  Lady,  96 

Howard,  Mrs.,  Swift's  account  of  his 
illness  to,  305 


I 


Ireland,  England  and,  261  ;  Anglican 
Church  in,  263  ;  State  of,  Swift  on, 
263 ;  Sheridan  on,  264  ;  Lecky  on, 
264 ;  Walpole  and,  265,  275,  276  ; 
famine  in  (1729),  276 


J 


Johnson,  Dr.,  62,  316 
Journalism,  influence  of,  in  eighteenth 
century,  42,  45 


K 


Kilkenny,  grammar  school,  61,  238 
King,     Archbishop,    83,     253 ;     and 

Wood's  ha'pence,  268  ;   letter  from 

Swift  to,  306,  313 


Laracor,   50,  51,  89;    Swift's   life  at, 

anecdotes  of,  239 
Leicester,  3,  4,  6,  239 
Lewis,  Mr.,  103,  107,  116 
Long,  Mrs,  Anne,  47,  148,  150 

M 

Manley,  Mrs.,  46 

Marlborough,  Duke  of,  75,  87  ;  Tory 
ministry  bent  on  overthrow,  108  et 
seq.f  116;  dismissal,  118,  320 

Marlborough,  Duchess  of,  47 

Masham,  Mrs.,  47 

Montague,  Lady  Mary  Wortley,  46 

Moor  Park,  24-26,  239 

Morley,  Lord,  on  Swift,  277 

Miinstcr,  Bishop  of,  15 

N 
Nottingham,  Earl  of,  1 16 

O 

Old  Whig,  the,  65 

Ormonde,  Duke  of,  14,  I7>  57  J 
Viceroy  of  Ireland,  88 


Orrery,  Lord,  148  ;  on  Swift  as  Dean 

of  St.  Patrick's,  247,  248,  395 
Osborne,  Sir  Peter  and  Lady,  12 


Parnell,  130,  289 

Partridge,  the  almanac  maker,  78  d  seq. 

"Patrick,"  Swift's  servant,   106,    121, 

149,  163 
Pembroke,  Lord,  57 
Peterborough,  Lord,  119 
Phillips,  Ambrose,  58 
Pilkington,  Mrs.  L.,  285 
Pope,  32,  44,  61,  68,  loi,   126,  130  ; 

on  Swift,  131,  253,  254,  258,  289  ; 

estimate  of,  292  et  seq.,  317,  319 
Prior,  Matthew,   115  et  seq.,  255,  256, 

28s 


Rivers,  Lord,  ill,  112 
Rochester,  Lord  President,  87 


SachevercU,  Dr.,  84,  86 

Sheridan,   Dr.,    285 ;    sketch   of,  295 

et  seq.,  316,  319 
Sheridan,  Thos.,  opinion  of  Swift,  I44, 

253,  260;  on  Ireland,  251,  252;  on 

Prior,   256,   275,  295  ;   on  Swift  in 

old  age,  303 
Somers,  Lord  John,  113,  116,  320 
Somerset,  Duke  of,  117 
Somerset,  Duchess  of,  and  the  Windsor 

Prophecy,  46,  113,  117 
Southwell,  Sir  Robert,  27,  31 
Spanish  Succession,  war  of,  85 
Spectator,  the,  43,  44,  64,  65,  67,  68, 

104 
St.  John,  Henry,  Viscount  Bolingbroke, 

88,  90,  91  ;  compared  with  Harley, 

91-101,  105-107,  1 17;  letter  to  Swift, 

1 19,  120 ;  quarrels  with  Harley,  137- 

139;    becomes   first  minister,    138; 

flight  of,  139 ;  Swift  on,  254  ;  letter 

to  Swift,  255,  276 
Steele,  Richard,  43,  45,  61,  65  ;  career 

of,  66-69,  83,  92,  103,  104 
Stella,  7,  8,  88,  90,  103,  104,  105,  117, 

127,  147  ;  her  life  and  relationship 

with  Swift,  151-167  ;  death  of,  178- 

180,  243,  297,  299 


INDEX 


339 


Sterne,  Bishop,  133,  299 

Sunderland,  Lord,  21 

Swift,  Godwin,  237,  238 

Swift,  Jonathan,  tlie  elder,  2 

Swift,  Jonathan,  b.  1667,  early  life,  I, 
2, 3;  becomes  secretary  to  Sir  Wm. 
Temple,  27,  28 ;  meets  King 
William  III.,  29  ;  takes  Oxford 
degree,  29  ;  goes  to  Court  over 
Triennial  Act,  30  ;  quarrels  with 
Temple  and  leaves  Moor  Park, 
31  ;  ordained  and  presented  to 
Kilroot,  31  ;  resigns  and  returns 
to  Moor  Park,  33  ;  death  of  Sir 
Wm.  Temple,  49 ;  becomes 
chaplain  to  Lord  Berkeley,  50- 
53;  Vicar  of  Laracor,  50,  51, 
239  et  seq.  ;  takes  his  D.D., 
T.C.D.,  57 ;  in  London  with 
Berkeley  family,  57,  58 ;  enters 
literary  society,  58 ;  secures 
favour  of  Whig  leaders,  69  ; 
attitude  towards  occasional  con- 
formity Bill  and  church  questions, 
70  et  seq.  ;  retires  to  Laracor,  77  ; 
represents  Ireland  over  the  first 
fruits  question,  78  j  quarrels  with 
Whigs  over,  81  ;  leaves  Whig 
Party,  88  ;  introduction  to  Harley, 
89  ;  St.  John,  90  ;  success  over 
firstfruits  with  Tory  ministry, 
90 ;  writes  for  the  Examiner,  102 ; 
begins  the  peace  campaign  with 
attacks  on  Marlboro',  108  et  seq. ; 
"The  Conduct  of  the  Allies,"  116; 
1711.  Victory  for  Government,  117  j 
attitude  of  ambassadors  towards, 
after  peace  of  Utrecht,  119; 
retires  to  Laracor,  122-124  '>  ^^^^^ 
to  obtain  preferment,  132 ;  reasons 
for,  133  ;  impatience  with  ministry 
in  consequence,  135  ;  prejudice 
against  Ireland,  133,  134;  is 
offered  the  deanery  of  St.  Patrick's, 
135;  accepts  (1713)  his  reception 
as,  246  et  seq,  ;  two  visits  to 
England  to  restore  harmony 
between  Harley  and  Bolingbroke, 
137-139,  248,  249  ;  first  seven 
years  as  Dean,  255,  265 
1 72 1.  Once  more  enters  public  life  as 
an  Irish  patriot,  257  et  seq.  ;  the 
coinage  trouble  and  the  Drapier 
letters,  267  et  seq. 
1726.  Last  visit  to  England,  275, 276 ; 
his  work  in  Dublin,  277  et  seq.  ; 
last  years,  284  et  seq. ;  his  illness, 


Swift,  Jonathan — continued. 

305  et  seq. ;  his  "  madness,"  322 

and  Appendix 
1745.  Death,  323 

character  and  appearance  of,  at  thirty- 
two,  48,  49 
as  portrayed  in  sculpture,  285  et  seq. 
contemporary  picture  of  in  1 7 1 3 . . ,  1 25 
as  an  old  man,  303 
his  recreations,  121 
his  childlike  mind,  122,  123 
his  altitude  towards  great  men,  123, 

.124. 
his  altitude  towards  Tory  ministers, 

124 
his  assistance  to  those  seeking  place, 

125,  127 
his  assistance  to  the  Whig  wits,  127 
as  a  patron  of  letters,  129,  144 
as  a  "club  man,"  129,  130,  130-132 
his  project  for  founding  an  English 

academy,  132 
his  bearing  in  society,  142,  143 
his  circle  of  friends,  140,  141  ;  devo- 
tion to  friends,  144-148,  255,  285 
his  charily,  148-150 
his  imagination  and  poetry,  181  etseq. 
his  satire,  195  et  seq. 
his  financial  position  over  his  writ- 
ings, 144 
influence   of  clubs    and    journalism 
upon,  44,  45,  58 
Swift  and  Arbuthnot,  131,  285  et  seq.., 
290,  313 
,,        Addison,  64,   103,   105,  128, 

141 
,,        Bolingbroke,    90,   95,  97  et 
seq.,   105,    106,    no,    139, 
145,  254,  255,  256,  276 
,,        Congreve,  61,  128 
,,        Harley,   89,  92  et  seq.,  105, 

113.  "9.139.  145-254.255 
„  Gay,  130,  285,  314,  317,  3ii> 
,,        King,  Archbishop  of  Dublin, 

253.  306,  313  _ 
,,        Marlborough,  loH  et  seq. 

Pope,    131,    144,    253,    258, 

293,  317,  319 
Prior,  115,  255,  256,  285 
,,        Queen  Anne,  46, 113, 116, 117 
,,        Sheridan,  Dr.,  144,  275,  295 

etseq.,  316,  319 
,,        Steele,  69,  103,  104 
,,        Esther  Johnson  r.  "  Stella  " 
,,        Vanessa  z/.EstherVanhomrigh 
,,        Varina  v.  Miss  Waring 
,,        Ireland,  236  et  seq.,  263 


340 


DEAN   SWIFT 


Swift  and  Sir  Wm.  Temple,  S  et  seq., 

76,  144 
,,       women,  47,  48 
,,        his  writings— 

"Resolutions,"  38,  39 

Letter  to  a  young  clergy- 
man, 51 

Battle  of  the  books,  33, 180, 
197,  217  et  seq. 

Tale  of  a  tub,  33,  70,  78, 
81,  197,  et  seq. 

Meditations  on  a  broom- 
stick, 53 

Petition  of  Mrs.  Frances 
Harris,  53 

Advice  to  servants,  53 

Discourse  on  the  Dissen- 
sions in  Athens  and 
Rome,  69 

Sentiments  of  a  Church  of 
England  man,  72,  83 

Prediction  for  the  year 
1708., .79 

Mr.  Bickersteth's  predic- 
tions and  vindication  of, 
79,  80 

Argument  to  prove  in- 
convenience of  abolish- 
ing Christianity,  83 

Project  for  advancement 
of  religion,  83 

Sid  Hamet's  rod,  91 

Conduct  of  the  Allies,  116, 
118 

The  Windsor  Prophecy,  117 

History  of  the  last  four 
years  of  Queen  Anne,  1 32 

Gulliver's  Travels,  181, 
190,  197,  222  et  seq., 
255,  283,  284 

Polite  Conversation,  190 
et  seq. 

Traulus,  194 

Memoirs  relating  to  that 
change  which  happened 
in  the  Queen's  ministry 
in  the  year  1710...257 

An  inquiry  into  the  be- 
haviour of  the  Queen's 
last  ministry,  257 


Swift  and  his  writings — cofttinued. 

Proposal  for  the  universal 

use  of  Irish  manufactures, 

258,  266 
Short  view  of  the  State  of 

Ireland,  263  et  seq. 
Drapier  letters,  269 
A   modest  proposal,  276, 

283 
On  doing  good,  279 
The  Legion  Club,  319 
Swift,  Thomas,  2 


Tatler,  the,  44,  67,  83,  88,  104 
Temple,  Sir  Wm.,  7-17,  20;  at  Moor 
Park,  22-26,  30 ;  essay  on  gardens, 
35, 76,  105  ;  his  description  of  Ireland 

234.  144 
Temple,  Lady,  6,  8,  li,  12,  33 
Tory  ministry,  the,  87,  88 
Tory  party,  divisions  of,  loi 
Triple  alliance,  the,  16 
Trinity  College,  Dublin,  3,  238 


V 


Vanhomrigh,  Esther  (Vanessa),  47,  48  ; 

letter  from  Swift,  136,  139,  156,  157  ; 

life  and  relations  with  Swift,  167-178, 

260,  314 
Voltaire,  influence  of  Bolingbroke  on, 

lOI 

W 

Walpole,  139,  265,  275,  276 
Waring,  Miss  (Varina),  32,  50 
Waterford,  Bishopric  of,  81,  133 
Wharton,    Lord,    and   the   Test   Act, 

77,  91 
Whig  Examiner,  the,  65,  102 
Whig  ministry,  the,  fall  of,  84-87 
Whiteway,  Mrs.,  285,  304,  319,  321 
William  III.,  22,  29 
Wilde,  Sir  Wm.,  237 
Witt,  John  de,  15,  16,  17,  18 
Wood's  ha'pence,  245,  267  et  seq. 


rKINTED   BY  WILLIAM   CLOWES  AND   SONS,   LIMITED,    LONDON   ANB   BECCLBS. 


UNIVERSITY  OF  CALIFORNIA  LIBRARY 

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